Rep. Trudi Walend (R-Transylvania) filed House Bill 22 Thursday. Under current law, damages paid to a claimant who is injured or damaged because of negligence by a state employee or someone on behalf of the state is limited to $500,000. Rep. Walend?s bill would increase that limit to $1,000,000.
The Insider, in a news clip posted Thursday afternoon, referred to her bill as a ?Tart Tort? and asked, ?So, is this what Republicans call tort reform? ?
Her idea stems from a real life situation in her district. Several years ago Representative Walend?s constituents, a young mother and her two-year-old daughter, were seriously and permanently injured due to the negligence of a NC DOT dump truck driver. The damages way exceeded $500,000. The state pleaded sovereign immunity to avoid paying the full amount. A regular citizen or private business would have been liable for the full amount. Rep. Walend?s is just putting state government under the same rule of law as the rest of ordinary citizens.
One of the arguments used against the trial attorneys? bill in the early 1990s to abolish contributory negligence, was that if it applied to the state, it would cost the state (and taxpayers) tens of millions of dollar a year. Further, it was not fair to abolish contributory negligence for average citizens, but leave it for the state.
If state government were subject to the same liability as private citizens, it would go a long way to help achieve overall tort reform.
