Committee reports due-pass recommendations on multiple public-safety bills; animal performance ban advances

In executive session Thursday, March 27, 2025, the House Community Safety Committee reported several bills out of committee with due-pass recommendations and deferred action on one bill. The committee approved a ban on certain traveling animal acts, clarified background-check rules for peace and corrections officers, advanced trauma-informed training requirements, and approved a change to licensing rules for prison-based substance use disorder treatment; the panel deferred action on one bill until a later date.

The committee reported out engrossed Senate Bill 5065, which would prohibit allowing specified animals—listed in the bill as elephants, nonhuman primates, bears, and nondomestic felines—to perform in traveling animal acts and establishes a gross misdemeanor for related violations. Representative Farvar urged…