§ 78B.004.Referral to Texas Civil Commitment Office

The chapter's constructive half, and it identifies who should answer the question.

A first responder may refer a person requesting a wellness check to the Texas Civil Commitment Office, which may provide the person with information regarding the current condition of the civilly committed sexually violent predator if authorized under federal and state law.

The Office is the right recipient. It supervises the commitment programme, knows the person's condition and location, and can answer without anyone travelling anywhere.

Both verbs are permissive. The responder may refer, and the Office may provide information — and only if authorized under federal and state law.

That last condition is doing real work. A committed person's medical and psychiatric information is protected, and the section does not create an exception to those protections. It permits disclosure only where the law otherwise allows it.

So the chapter as a whole redirects rather than refuses. A person concerned about a committed individual is not told the question cannot be asked — they are told where to ask it, with the answer governed by the ordinary privacy rules.

Read with the preceding sections, the chapter removes an obligation from one body and points to another, without creating a right to the information from either.