The Texas State Board of Pharmacy will meet Nov. 3 in Austin and vote on a rule that would stop pharmacies from leaving prescription drugs at a prescriber’s office unless the patient is the one collecting them or is given them there. The deadline to sign up to speak passed at 5 p.m. Oct. 30; the agenda allows no comment from the floor.
The rule lists the only places a pharmacy may send prescriptions, and a doctor’s office is one of them. As it stands, a pharmacy may deliver what Texas law calls a dangerous drug — a prescription drug that is not a controlled substance — there with no condition attached, while a controlled substance may go only as a single dose to be given to the patient. The change the board published in September would attach a condition to the first: the drug must be for the patient to collect at that office, or to be given to the patient there.
The board is candid that this is a tightening. Its own filing says the change would expand an existing regulation by limiting when a pharmacy may deliver a dangerous drug to a prescriber’s office, while finding no cost to pharmacies large or small. Comments closed around Oct. 18 and the board has not published what it received; a summary normally appears only with the adopted rule. The same section is on the agenda a second time, as a fresh proposal, and the notice does not say what that second set of changes would do. It is the third change to this one section in two years and, counting that fresh proposal, the fourth in train — after a December 2024 clarification that U.S. Mail counts as a common carrier and amendments effective last September that allowed delivery by contract carrier and by drone.
Members also take up eleven sections governing the sworn statements pharmacies use to certify records, a four-year review of the chapter covering all classes of pharmacy, and amendments to the sterile compounding rule the board overhauled in March over objections from compounders and a drugmaker. Staff report on the state’s prescription monitoring database and on the program for pharmacists in recovery, and the board will review its budget request for 2028 and 2029.
Three cases are set for decision on proposals from the state’s administrative law judges, two involving pharmacy technicians and one a pharmacist. Each is paired with a closed session and no findings have been made. The board will close by evaluating its executive director behind closed doors.
Meeting at a glance
- When
- 9:00 AM, Tuesday, November 3, 2026. TRD 2026006298 was filed October 22 at 8:10 p.m. The board held a member training session Nov. 2.
- Where
- George H.W. Bush State Office Building, 1801 Congress Ave., Suite 4.300, Austin.
- Governing body & chair
- Texas State Board of Pharmacy — eleven members appointed by the governor to six-year terms: seven pharmacists, one pharmacy technician and three public members. Julie Spier of Katy is president.
- Format
- Nine lettered sections. Speaking required a request form filed by 5 p.m. Oct. 30, in person and on agenda items only. Closed sessions on three disciplinary cases and the executive director.
- Live video
- None found for the live meeting. The board posts recordings of past meetings on its own site.
- Full agenda
- Secretary of State Open Meeting Viewer · board meetings page
Board members
- Julie Spier, R.Ph. — president; Katy; pharmacist.
- Jenny Downing Yoakum, R.Ph. — vice president; Kilgore; pharmacist.
- Suzette Tijerina, R.Ph. — treasurer; Castle Hills; pharmacist.
- Rick Fernandez, R.Ph. — Argyle; pharmacist.
- Donnie Lewis, R.Ph. — Athens; pharmacist.
- Randy Martin, Pharm.D. — Fort Worth; pharmacist.
- Donna Montemayor, R.Ph. — San Antonio; pharmacist.
- Stacy Hightower, Ph.T.R. — Aubrey; pharmacy technician member.
- Heisha Freeman — Fate; public member.
- Ian Shaw — Dallas; public member.
- Rick Tisch — Spring; public member.
Names and officer titles are from the board’s members page, read October 26; cities and terms from the board’s 2025 annual report and the governor’s appointment releases of February 26, 2025 and October 2, 2025. Neither the board nor the governor labels which seat each member holds; the allocation above follows each member’s credential and the public-member designations in the annual report. The board’s February 2026 minutes record a different vice president and treasurer, and its August 4 agenda carried an election for both offices; minutes of that meeting have not been posted. Composition is set by Occupations Code §552.001, terms by §552.005. Daniel Carroll is executive director. Meeting contact: Lily Moreno, (512) 305-8026.