HB4361

HB4361 directs the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board to adopt rules establishing standardized procedures for timely emergency notifications at public institutions of higher education. The board must consult campus administrators, faculty, staff and students.

The procedures must comply with the federal Jeanne Clery Campus Safety Act and include alerts through the system already required by Education Code Section 51.218. That existing system uses email or telephone notifications in addition to other appropriate methods, enrolls students and staff when they begin, permits an annually renewed opt-out, and protects the collected personal contact information. HB4361 does not create those existing requirements anew or remove the opt-out.

The incorporated federal statute, 20 U.S.C. Section 1092(f), distinguishes immediate emergency notification from timely reporting of threatening crimes. Its emergency provision addresses confirmation of a significant emergency or dangerous situation presenting an immediate campus health or safety threat, with an exception when notification would compromise efforts to contain the emergency. HB4361 calls for standardized procedures consistent with that framework; it does not itself specify a universal number of minutes for every alert.

The act took effect June 20, 2025, immediately upon the governor’s signature after the required votes. Rules must be adopted as soon as practicable, not by a fixed date stated in this bill. The new Chapter 61 provision uses the statutory public-institution category. The fact that the older Section 51.218 also covers private institutions does not make HB4361 a newly imposed private-college alert-system mandate.