So, better off to call no legislators at this point?
Yes.
At this point, the bill is sitting in the pile of bills that has come out of their various committees. The L&C (local and consent) committee is responsible for deciding which path the bill will follow. They will look at the bill and try to decide if it is likely to pass w/out any discussion. If they think it will pass, it gets placed on their calendar, the Local and Consent Calendar. Every bill placed on this calendar is then put before the House members the next week. If 5 or more members disapprove of the bill, it gets jerked to the slow track. If debate/discussion lasts longer than 10 minutes, slow track.
If the committee gets bugged a lot about a particular bill, they are just as likely to figure the will be controversial and subject to significant debate. If they think that, they will put it on the regular calendar and those bills come up one at a time and get examined/debated/commented on to death. The further down the list your bill is placed on the calendar, the less likely it will even be debated on, much less voted on.
This is what happened to the similar bill last year. It got put on the "slow track", and was placed on the calendar as the very last bill to be considered for the legislative session. NEVER in the history of Texas, as a Republic or a State, before, during or after Reconstruction, has the last bill ever been reached. All these tail end bills just sit and die.
We don't need to be waving any red flags at this time. We need to just sit here like little mice and hope the L&C committee doesn't hear any flak about it from some representative(s). It should, at most, take a week or 2 for them to work their way down through the pile of bills. Then, the following week, it might pass and then go to the Senate.
