Talking Travis: Elliott Naishtat

Rep. Elliott Naishtat (Photo by John Anderson)

With nine sessions under his belt, Rep. Elliott Naishtat is arguably the dean of the Travis County House delegation. Watching him on the floor, his day is measured and thoughtful. Constantly moving from desk-side meeting to desk-side meeting, when he's at his own seat, he's pouring over files, or making calls. Naishtat is intellectually fastidious and measured in what he says (he's notorious for occasionally even enunciating the punctuation on quotes, ensuring the readers get exactly what he was saying). If a reporter asks him a question to which he doesn't have the precise answer, he'll contact his staff, do the research, and get the answer right. Yes, when Naishtat says, "I'll get back to you," he's not blowing you off. That experience counts. Well before the cut-off date of May 14 for second reading on the daily and supplemental calendars, he'd already got 13 bills over to the Senate, "Almost all of them to do with health and human services," he said. That includes HB3352, which would require DPS to include court-adjudicated mental health issues as part of a firearms background check. "One of the problems with the guy at Virginia Tech is that, although he was clearly mentally incapacitated, they didn't have a similar law," he gravely noted.

Reps. Elliott Naishtat and Eddie Rodriguez (Photo by John Anderson)

Some, like the requirements in HB392 for nursing homes to carry automated external defibrillator units, are already back from the Senate for final House review. Three have already made it to the governor for signing.

A large number of his bills are like the gun application reforms: Filling obvious gaps and closing intolerable loopholes. Take HB3866: "The bill that would require that fire safety inspections be done by trained, certified fire safety inspectors," he explained. That measure was a response to the tragic fire at a homeless shelter earlier this year in Paris, Texas. "People died," he added bluntly.

For the bills that have passed, there are also those that have failed. His slate of capital punishment legislation, like HJR 58, has always faced an up-hill climb. That resolution proposes a constitutional amendment allowing the governor to issue 30 day reprieves on executions: Even though he pushed it right to the wire, it fizzled out on the intent calendar after he faced what he called "the governor’s adamant opposition to being given the authority to declare a moratorium.

The same fate also met HB 877, calling for a commission into the state’s capital punishment process. Even though "everyone knows that system is broken," he said, there was too much opposition and it died in Calendars.

His determination to stick with an issue, session after session, even if it's not politically expedient, is part of what has distinguished his time in the Lege. Take HB 164, his latest iteration of medical marijuana legalization: As always, it failed. "I'm not surprised, though, because it never got a hearing," he said. But it will be back, because he believes it's a fight worth re-fighting. "You guys always refer to this as my perennial bill, in sort of a disparaging tone, but I will introduce this every session until it passes."