Pub. 60 2019-2020 Issue 5

14 Bryan Case Leads TADA Legislative Committee and Team into Uncertain Session P reparations for the 87th Regular Session of the Texas Legislature began in January of this year with TADA Chair Nancy Harper ap- pointing Bryan Case of Classic South- east Texas in Beaumont as TADA Legislative Chairman for 2021-2022. While Bryan will admit he ended up in the car business by accident, he is a proud first-generation automobile dealer who grew up on the operations side of the business. Bryan, who now operates eight franchises in Southeast Texas, is a longtime Board Member of TADA and a veteran of the TADA Legislative Committee. Following the appointment of Bryan and the other members of the commit- tee, a full TADA Legislative Commit- tee call took place in early February, and a meeting of the lobby team occurred in early March. Everything seemed to be on track. The only major uncertainties identified at the time were who would be the next House Speaker after Speaker Dennis Bonnen’s retirement and how would the Legislature find the billions of dollars needed to continue the school and property tax reforms enacted last session. “I felt really good about where we were in the first part of March as we were way ahead of the curve in terms of our preparations. We had identified the major issues we expected, and we were actively considering a number of proposals to assist the dealers in their business operations.” As everyone knows, events of the last six months have upended any notion of the normalcy we felt in early March. In these past sixmonths, we have witnessed the effects of a global pandemic and the COVID-19 disease infecting millions of Americans, a partial shutdown of our economy as only essential businesses were allowed to remain open in some cases, and Americans staying home to prevent the spread of the virus. The shutdowns subsequently triggered an economic recession and left millions of Ameri- cans unemployed. As if this were not enough, oil prices collapsed to the point that they briefly traded for negative $37 a barrel. While the price of oil has since rebounded to around $40 per barrel, the current budget for the State of Texas is predicated on prices per barrel in the low to mid $50s. Despite the shutdown and economic turmoil, the franchised auto dealers in Texas remained open for business as essential businesses. They kept their employees working, often with the assistance of the Federal PPP pro- gram enacted under the CARES Act. Quickly after sales fell precipitously in late March and early April, Texas dealer sales rebounded as the economy started to open back up after the April shutdown in Texas. Despite the sales recovery, inventory levels of new and used vehicles and the long-term ef- fect of the pandemic on jobs and the economy continue to cloud the future. Uncertainty abounds on the legisla- tive and political fronts as well. The Capitol has been closed to the public since mid-March and Interim hearings have been relegated mainly to requests for information from state agencies and interested stakeholders. Lawmak- ers continue to struggle with how the Chambers and building can safely handle the return of lawmakers, staff, and visitors in January when the session