Floor Packet Page No. 75 Amend CSSB 7 by adding the following appropriately numbered SECTION and renumbering subsequent SECTIONS accordingly: SECTION ____. Section 161.121, Utilities Code, as amended by Section 18.15, SB 1368, Acts of the 76th Legislature, Regular Session, 1999, is amended to read as follows: Sec. 161.121. GENERAL POWERS. (a) An electric cooperative may: (1) sue and be sued in its corporate name; (2) adopt and alter a corporate seal and use the seal or a facsimile of the seal as required by law; (3) acquire, own, hold, maintain, exchange, or use property or an interest in property, including plants, buildings, works, machinery, supplies, equipment, apparatus, and transmission and distribution lines or systems that are necessary, convenient, or useful; (4) dispose of, mortgage, or lease as lessor any of its property or assets; (5) borrow money and otherwise contract indebtedness, issue obligations for its indebtedness, and secure the payment of indebtedness by mortgage, pledge, or deed of trust on any or all of its property or revenue; (6) accept gifts or grants of money, services, or property; (7) make any contracts necessary or convenient for the exercise of the powers granted by this chapter; (8) conduct its business and have offices inside or outside this state; (9) adopt and amend bylaws not inconsistent with the articles of incorporation for the administration and regulation of the affairs of the cooperative; and (10) perform any other acts for the cooperative or its members or for another electric cooperative or its members, and exercise any other power, that may be necessary, convenient, or appropriate to accomplish the purpose for which the cooperative is organized, including other or additional purposes that benefit members and nonmembers, either directly or through affiliates, described in Section A, Article 2.01, Texas Non-Profit Corporation Act (Article 1396-2.01, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes). (b) Notwithstanding Subsection (a) or any other law, an electric cooperative, either directly or through an affiliate, may not conduct a business venture in competition with a for-profit enterprise. This subsection does not apply to a business venture directly related to a power of the cooperative that the cooperative had under this chapter or a predecessor statute to this chapter when the cooperative was originally organized.