House Speaker Joe Straus made appointments Tuesday to the Select Committee to Determine a Sufficient Balance of the Economic Stabilization Fund (ESF).
Speaker Straus named Rep. Sarah Davis of Houston as Co-Chair. He also appointed Reps. Donna Howard of Austin, Lyle Larson of San Antonio, Drew Springer of Muenster and Armando Walle of Houston to serve on the committee.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has also appointed senators Paul Bettencourt and Donald ‘Don’ Huffines to the Joint Select Committee to Determine a Sufficient Balance of the Economic Stabilization Fund.
The purpose of the committee is to determine and adopt for the next biennium a sufficient balance of the Economic Stabilization Fund (Rainy Day Fund). When the committee, created during the 2013 legislative session met in December 2014 before the 83rd Session began, they unanimously adopted a motion that the ESF sufficient balance would be $7 billion for that fiscal biennium. For the upcoming biennium, the ESF is projected to have a balance of $10.4 billion at the end of the current budget cycle in August 2017.