House Co-Sponsorship Memoranda

House of Representatives
Session of 2013 - 2014 Regular Session

Posted:	January 14, 2013 04:05 PM
From:	Representative RoseMarie Swanger
To:	All House members
Subject:	Recovery of Costs by Property Owners Challenging Eminent Domain

I plan to re-introduce HB 362 that will increase the amount of money that can be reimbursed toward reasonable expenses actually incurred for appraisal, attorney and engineering fees in eminent domain proceedings. The current reimbursement is limited to $4,000, and my legislation would increase that figure to $25,000. The reason that I am reintroducing this legislation is that I had a constituent who successfully challenged an eminent domain proceeding taken by a public utility. When my constituent sought to recover legal fees — which were well in excess of the $4,000 cap —the constituent was left paying attorney's costs that would have otherwise been qualified for reimbursement by the public utility had this cap not been so low. I believe that eminent domain proceedings should be fair, and I encourage you to join me in making this important change to the law that will protect property owners.
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Introduced as HB751