A number of consumer issues before the Legislature have been discussed in this column over the past few months. But not all legislation gets passed.

Here's what happened to a few bills:

• Financial literacy requirements for high school graduation: passed. Personal financial literacy will be incorporated into the economics credit of public high schools beginning in the 2006-07 school year. The material will be part of the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills test beginning in 2008-09.

A similar bill on public school financial education, written by Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, also passed. It calls for a personal finance course to be taught in five school districts as a pilot program. Funding for the class will come from corporate and nonprofit donations.

"Young people will now be empowered with the tools to make wise financial choices and avoid financial hardships in the future," said Courtney Nickles, chairwoman for Texas Jump$tart Coalition, a financial literacy group of 300 organizations, financial institutions, government agencies and corporations.

Nationally, seven states -- Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, New York, Georgia, Utah and Alabama -- require personal finance education for high school graduation, according to the National Council on Economic Education.

• Real estate sales price disclosure: failed. Despite support in both chambers, this legislation was rolled into a broader property tax reform bill, which failed. Texas is one of just seven states that don't disclose real estate sales prices to appraisal districts.

• Tax refund-anticipation loans regulation: failed. State Rep. Michael Villarreal, D-San Antonio, author of the legislation, said the bill was bogged down in committee, but he anticipates it to be a "two-session" process.

Villarreal had a number of backers, including the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, the National Consumer Law Center and the Children's Defense Fund. The agencies contend that refund loans prey upon the poor with high fees and high interest rates.

Last year, Texans lost nearly $166 million to these short-term, high-cost loans, which work like an advance on a tax refund, according to the Children's Defense Fund. In Tarrant County, more than 89,600 taxpayers, or 17 percent of all Tarrant taxpayers, took out refund-anticipation loans in 2003, the latest numbers available, according to the CDF.

• Funeral business changes: failed. Four bills were introduced in the House and Senate regarding the funeral industry that were not consumer friendly, said Jim Bates, president of the board of the Funeral Consumer Alliance of North Texas, a discount funeral organization.

One bill required Texans to use a funeral director in order to be cremated, which would have resulted in higher cremation costs, according to Bates.

Searching the lobbyist database at the Texas Ethics Commission, Bates said he tabulated that the funeral industry spent almost $750,000 lobbying for these bills. In a counterattack, the FCA asked its 4,000 North Texas members to urge their state representatives to oppose the legislation.

Meanwhile, Bates and Lamar Hankins, director of the Funeral Consumers Alliance of Texas, took vacation from their regular jobs to go to Austin to testify before legislative committees.

• Reverse mortgage line of credit: put on the November ballot. Texans will vote Nov. 8 on a constitutional amendment to allow reverse mortgage lines of credit.

A reverse mortgage is a loan that enables homeowners 62 or older to borrow against equity in their home without having to sell, give up title or take on a new monthly mortgage payment. No credit standards need to be met by the borrower, besides an appraisal.

At present, the money from a reverse mortgage can only be taken in a lump sum or a fixed monthly payment.