Texas Attorney General Opinion: JM-1234 Page: 3 of 8
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Honorable Mike Driscoll - Page 3 (JM-1234)
regarding mental health services and articles 5547-13,
5547-14, and 5547-15, and concluded:
(The fee provision] sets the clerk's fee
in 'each original cause or action in a
Probate Court . . . due and payable and to be
paid by the party . . .initiating said
cause. . . ' In an action involving a
mentally ill person, the clerk's total fee
for services in connection with proceeding
under articles 5547-13 through 5547-15 is set
at $40.00. . . . (The fee statute] thus
limits the amount that may be charged for
filing a petition, issuing notices, adminis-
tering oaths, and performing all other
clerical duties in connection with the kinds
of commitment listed in article 5547-14. If
the county judge allows compensation to an
appointed attorney or physician under article
5547-15, it is taxed as costs in the case,
and the clerk has certain duties with respect
to collecting it. . . . The fee statute]
does not attempt to repeal the provisions of
the Mental Health Code regarding payment of
attorneys' fees, physicians' fees, and tran-
sportation costs. Since these fees are not
paid to the clerk, they are unaffected by
[the fee statute].
See also Attorney General Opinion M-135 (1967). In other
words, Attorney General Opinion H-1097 determined that any
services of the county clerk in regard to mental health
proceedings, including the filing of an application, were to
be considered services listed in articles 5547-13 through
5547-15 and that the total fee for any such services was to
be $40.
It is significant that Attorney General Opinion H-1097
did not conclude that the fee statute had repealed any
specific language of articles 5547-13 through 5547-15. If
Attorney General Opinion H-1097 had concluded that specific
portions of articles 5547-13 through 5547-15 had been
repealed, we would have to consider whether any such por-
tions had been revived, since articles 5547-13 through
5547-15 were revised and reenacted in 1983 as part of a
substantive revision of the mental health statutes. Acts
1983, 68th Leg., ch. 47, 1, at 211 (eff. Sept. 1, 1983).
Fortunately, we have been spared that effort. Because
nothing in the 1983 revisions calls the conclusion ofp. 6567
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Texas. Attorney-General's Office. Texas Attorney General Opinion: JM-1234, text, October 16, 1990; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth273672/m1/3/: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.