Texas House halts work until Sunday in show of frustration over stalled bills in the Senate fox4news.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from fox4news.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Safety advocates are concerned about its potential impact on road conditions.
A bill that would make it harder to get damages from trucking companies after crashes has passed the Texas House, though recent amendments may have softened the bill’s potential impact.
HB 19 would separate liability trials into two phases. The version that passed a House committee
wouldn’t allow evidence of a company’s poor training or oversight of a truck driver to be shown in the first phase. Additionally, under the bill, the second phase would only consider claims of gross negligence, a charge with a much higher standard of proof than ordinary negligence.
Bill limiting liability for trucking companies passes Texas House Morgan O Hanlon, The Dallas Morning News
Updated at 3:20 p.m. with additional developments.
A bill that would make it harder to successfully sue commercial trucking companies is moving forward after a series of postponements on the House floor.
According to the bill’s author, Plano Republican Jeff Leach, the legislation would create a fair framework that ensures victims in collisions involving commercial vehicles can have their day in court, while also protecting commercial motor vehicle operators from excessive lawsuits. On third reading Friday, the legislation, House Bill 19, passed 81-49.
“With passage of this bill, we will see commercial vehicle insurance rates fall in the state,” Leach promised during testimony to the House floor on Thursday.
Bill limiting liability for trucking companies passes Texas House dallasnews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from dallasnews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
AUSTIN Most residents in rural Fayette County, about halfway between Austin and Houston, had no idea in 2016 their community was about to be on the receiving end of 40 million pounds of sewage sludge every year.
That is until a legal notice published in the back pages of the local newspaper alerted residents of the application to use ranchland along the Colorado River as a dumping ground for the sludge trucked in from Texas capital city. After that notice appeared in our newspaper, there was a public outcry, recalled Regina Keilers, publisher of the Fayette County Record. And within weeks, the application was withdrawn.