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homestead, you would have to reside there, or you would have to be <br />intending to reside there and be preparing it. <br />Councilman Bell said the word intent for determination of residency is <br />all through everything that has come out of the Secretary State, it is <br />intent, and for anyone else to determine my intent, it is going to take <br />a court of law. <br />Councilman Bell said he would be willing to submit to another opinion, <br />and that being the Attorney General, if this Council wishes to go that <br />route. <br />City Attorney Haynes said, in Mr. Bell's case the intent is not an <br />important factor with regard to homestead, and the reason it is not is <br />because you already have a home on the property outside the city. <br />Those cases deal with that intent are people that bought land intending <br />to build a house on it, primarily rural, and Mr. Bell's does come under <br />the definition of rural since it is not served by City Police. The <br />reason for that occupancy being required is prohibit someone from <br />fraudulently claiming a homestead to defeat a creditor in a place where <br />they really did not have a homestead. That is the primary thing that <br />the cases talk about in that area, but where people make designations <br />which happens regularly they designate one place a homestead so they <br />can borrow money on another place, and they are able to borrow money on <br />another place when they have designated the other place where they live <br />as their residence homestead. <br />The definition of residence in the Secretary of State's Law is as <br />follows "In this Code "residence" means domicile, that is, one's home <br />and fixed place of habitation to which he intends to return after any <br />temporary absence (b) residence shall be determined in accordance with <br />the common -law rules, as enunciated by the courts of this state, except <br />as otherwise provided by this code. (c) A person does not lose his <br />residence by leaving his home to go to another place for temporary <br />purposes only, (d) A person does not acquire a residence in a place to <br />which he has come for temporary purposes only and without the intention <br />of making that place his home, (e) A person who is an inmate in a penal <br />institution or who is an involuntary inmate in a hospital or <br />eleemosynary institution does not, while an inmate, acquire residence <br />at the place where the institution is located ". That is the total <br />definition of residence as stated in the section under residence of the <br />Election Code, and the important part of that is a person can go from <br />his home temporary to another place to seek employment, or be in <br />hospital, or do whatever is necessary and come back home and never lose <br />that homestead. <br />Councilman Bell said it was his intent, that he has lived in several <br />place in the past 13 years, and almost between each and everyone of <br />them 2221 Lamar has and is my place of residence, the Texas Department <br />of Public Safety advised me to declare that so he would not have to <br />change his drivers license, the voter registration is there, it is his <br />intent, and it is what Mr. Haynes read. Mr. Bell said the house on 195 <br />has been shown a number of times, it has been offered for sale, and it <br />is the intent that is important, now I can not answer any questions <br />