MILITARY LEAVE TIME ACCOUNTS

(a) A municipality shall maintain military leave time accounts for the fire and police departments and must maintain a separate military leave time account for each department. (b) A military leave time account shall benefit a fire fighter or police officer who: (1) is a member of the Texas National Guard or the armed forces reserves of the United States; (2) was called to active federal military duty while serving as a fire fighter or police officer for the municipality; and (3) has served on active duty for a period of 3 continuous months or longer. (c) A fire fighter or police officer may donate any amount of accumulated vacation, holiday, sick, or compensatory leave time to the military leave time account in that fire fighter's or police officer's department to help provide salary continuation for fire fighters or police officers who qualify as eligible beneficiaries of the account under Subsection (b). A fire fighter or police officer who wishes to donate time to an account under this section must authorize the donation in writing on a form provided by the fire or police department and approved by the municipality. (d) A municipality shall equally distribute the leave time donated to a military leave time account among all fire fighters or police officers who are eligible beneficiaries of that account. The municipality shall credit and debit the applicable military leave time account on an hourly basis regardless of the cash value of the time donated or used.