A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Sen. Merritt has introduced SB 463 which would mandate that a minor wear a helmet while riding a bicycle, skateboard, skates, or scooter on public property. Public property isn’t defined, but I assume that would include sidewalks, streets, cul-de-sacs, and what have you in addition to parks and other governmental real estate holdings. It would be an infraction, penalized by a $50 fine and potential impoundment of the bicycle, skateboard, skates, or scooter. The impoundment would last until the kid’s parent came to the office and provides “assurance that the violation will not be repeated.” It would also be a violation for a parent to permit a violation by the kid.

My gut reaction is that this is a little micro-managey, but then I know that others have the same reaction to seat belt laws which I think are a great idea that have prevented all kinds of pain and suffering, outweighing the relatively minor government intrusion. So, for me, it’s a line drawing issue rather than a black and white ideological issue.

Rep. Speedy has introduced HB 1337 concerning religious motivated crime. (Sidenote: are the kids still using 1337 for “leet” speak?) It says that a person who knowingly or intentionally causes bodily injury because of the other person’s actual or perceived religion or creed commits a religious motivated crime, a Level 4 felony. A couple of thoughts: first, if this moves they should consider making it causing moderate or serious bodily injury. As luck would have it, I was reading a case where even temporary pain will satisfy the “bodily injury” requirement. Not that I condone that, but if you poke someone in the forehead in a way that hurts briefly, taunting them because it’s Ash Wednesday, I think that should be condemned and even punished, but I don’t know that it’s a Level 4 felony.

I can see where crimes motivated by religion are a bigger concern for society than your run-of-the-mill crime. History is lousy with death and destruction caused by religious conflict. So, there is a rational basis for policymakers to pay extra attention to conflict generated by religion — much as there is a rational, historical basis for taking a closer look at crimes motivated by race and gender. But, my second thought is whether it should be expanded to include not only crimes motivated by the religion of the victim, but also crimes motivated by the religion of the perpetrator. If you stone a woman because you think your religious beliefs require it of you, that strikes me as being a similar problem to shooting someone because you think they’re a Jew or a Christian or whatever religion you happen not to like.

Sen. Stoops has introduced SB 308 regarding Indiana’s partition fence law. First, a disclosure: I’m going to do you, the readers, a disservice. There are many wonders and mysteries to be found in Indiana’s fence law, but I don’t really feel like going back and researching them to provide a fuller description of what they are. I’m just going to look at the bit that’s in this SB 308. My best guess is that Sen. Stoops has some neighbors in his district who aren’t getting along. The current partition fence law says, in part, that when there is an existing fence and a neighbor uses that fence as part of a project to enclose land that wasn’t previously enclosed, the existing fence becomes a “partition fence.” The person who put up the new fencing has to pay the owner of the existing fence 50% of what that existing fence cost. SB 308 would eliminate that provision and provide that the person who built the existing fence is responsible for its maintenance.

I can see this either way. On the one hand, the owner of the existing fence put it up for his or her own purposes, and those purposes continue to be served even if the other neighbor piggy backs off of it to enclose some additional property. On the other hand, the neighbor is a free rider with respect to the existing fence and maybe that isn’t fair either. I’m a city-dweller and maybe don’t appreciate the full importance of fencing, but this law does seem like one of those things that was probably incredibly important for 19th century Hoosiers that seems like a bit of an anachronism in the 21st century.

Sen. Spartz has introduced SB 406 which would mandate marriage counseling prior to a court issuing a final order of dissolution in divorce proceedings where the couple has children. There are exceptions where at least one of the spouses certifies that they’ve been a victim of domestic abuse by the other, the court finds that reconciliation is infeasible, or the court finds other good cause to excuse the counseling. The counseling must be at least two hours long and contain the following content:

(A) Creation of a plan of reconciliation, if feasible.
(B) Education on the effects of divorce on a child’s physical and mental health.
(C) Information on how the parties can minimize the effects of the dissolution of marriage action on the parties’ children.
(D) Provision of referrals to community services for the parties and the parties’ children.

The legislation gestures toward courts entering into agreements with counselors who will waive fees where there is a financial hardship, but my guess is that won’t be especially feasible. I don’t know enough about divorce proceedings or counseling to know for sure, but my guess is that this will mostly be wasted money and effort. If you’re on the brink of finalizing a divorce, I have a hard time believing that a two hour counseling session is going to move the needle very much. Divorce is a huge pain in the ass on its own — people generally aren’t going through the process frivolously. That said, I do like the idea of providing people with information on how to minimize the impact of divorce on the kids and on community resources that can help.

Sen. Ford has introduced SB 441 which would alter the law with respect to interest on money judgments. Under current law, unless you have a contract that provides for a lower interest rate, if you get a money judgment against someone, that judgment accrues interest at the rate of 8% per year until paid. Under the proposed legislation, that interest rate would become the lesser of 8% or “the applicable adjusted rate of interest calculated under IC 6-8.1-10-1(c) as of the date of payment of the interest on the judgment.”  That adjusted rate of interest is “the percentage rounded to the nearest whole number that equals two (2) percentage points above the average investment yield on state general fund money for the state’s previous fiscal year, excluding pension fund investments, as determined by the treasurer of state on or before October 1 of each year and reported to the commissioner [of the Department of Revenue].” This adjusted rate calculation would apply to judgments entered after July 1, 2019, and to unpaid portions of money judgments entered before July 1, 2019.

I will tell you that, as a collection attorney, I sometimes have trouble explaining the basic concept of interest to debtors. (My standard example is along the lines of “well, if I owed you $100, would you rather I pay  you today or pay you in a year?” They, of course recognize that it’s better to have money today than in a year. Then I explain that the 8% is a way of compensating creditors for the delay.) I do not look forward to explaining the mysteries of the “average investment yield on state general fund money.” Nor do I look forward to adjusting the interest rates from year to year on all of the open collection files.

I wouldn’t object strenuously to the General Assembly lowering the interest rate down from 8%. I’m pretty sure it’s been at 8% for the 20 years I’ve been practicing law and the general trend over that period of time has been lower interest rates. But making it variable seems like a big hassle.

I believe that HB 1264, introduced by Rep. Pressel” is of the “ripped from the headlines” genre of legislating. Not that I disagree with it: it makes it a felony for a physician who treats a patient for infertility to use the physician’s own sperm or eggs without the patient’s consent or to use donated human reproductive material without the consent of the donor. It also provides a civil cause of action by the woman who was impregnated or her surviving spouse against the physician. The person can recover their attorney’s fees, costs of fertility treatment, and actual damages or $10,000 (whichever is greater). (Seems like that $10k should be higher.) It also delays the time for bringing prosecution based on how long it takes the State to reasonably discover that the fertility fraud has been committed.

Dr. Rocky Killion, superintendent of the West Lafayette Schools, has an op-ed in the Lafayette Journal & Courier prompted by the House Education Committee’s proposal to raise teacher salaries by diverting money away from other school funding necessities such as custodial, maintenance, secretarial, health, special education and other supports services for students and teachers. Rather than increasing the burden on teachers by diverting money away from those supports, Killion identifies $180 million wasted on school testing mandates and private school vouchers that the General Assembly should eliminate, freeing up money for teacher salaries:  $100 million on standardized testing; $10 million on I-READ 3 testing; and $70 million on vouchers.

My favorite line from the column was with respect to I-READ 3, “Teachers do not need this test to determine whether or not a student is reading at a third-grade level. The best, most efficient way to find out if a third-grade student is reading at a third-grade level is by asking a third-grade teacher.” Dr. Killion also points out that 60% of students who are using taxpayer dollars to attend a private/religious school have never attended a public school.

I have a slightly less dignified take on the current proposal:

Teachers: Hey, General Assembly, . . . hey! How about a little something, you know… for the effort, you know?

General Assembly: Oh, uh, there won’t be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.

So, they’ve got that going for them. Which is nice.

 

 

 

Sen. Kruse has introduced SB 373 concerning flags and god in public schools. He wants to mandate that a framed picture of a U.S. flag, a state flag, and the words “in God we Trust” be placed in every public school library and classroom. The entire display must be at least 14 x 17 inches with the motto being at least 4×15 and each flag being 5×5.

The bill also amends the current legislation permitting schools to offer a survey of religion class by specifying that the survey may include the study of the Bible as one of the permissible documents that may be studied in the survey. It does not specify any of the holy texts of other religions as eligible for study (although, under current law, the Bible and all of those other documents are already eligible for study.)  The bill also states that a school corporation may mandate the teaching of creation science as one of the “various theories concerning the origin of life.”

Current law allows a parent to pull a kid from school to go receive religious instruction for two hours a week. This bill would allow the school to adopt a policy to award academic credit for that religious instruction. Finally, the legislation adds some happy talk about the liberty of the parent to direct the education of a child being a fundamental right and some strict scrutiny language to the effect that a school policy or state law can’t infringe upon that right unless it demonstrates the need for the policy or statute is “of the highest order and not otherwise served.”

This stuff about flags, “in God We Trust,” singling out the Bible for special mention, and Creation Science is about marking territory and isn’t calculated to improve kids’ educations. The policy giving credit for religious instruction actually doesn’t strike me as that bad as it’s written (how it worked in practice could be problematic.) The strict scrutiny language on a parent’s right to direct the kid’s education is ripe for unintended consequences and, beyond that, ignores the fact that the public also has an interest in an educated citizenry — exactly where and how we should draw the line where the parent’s interest and the public interest intersect is a tough question, worth more thought than this legislation reflects.

Much as I complain about her incessant pursuit of mandatory cursive legislation, I do like the sentiment behind Sen. Leising’s SB 169 concerning service animals. It makes it a Class A infraction for a person to misrepresent that the person “is an individual with a disability or has a disability related need that requires the use of a service animal” or to fit “an animal that is not a service animal with a harness, collar, tag, vest, or sign that would cause a reasonable person to believe the animal is a service animal.” A few years back, I had a case where a guy had paid an organization a few dollars to give him a vest and ID card for his dog that said “emotional support animal.” When my client’s turned him away, saying that service animals were allowed inside and emotional support animals were not, he sued my client, claiming that he was disabled and the dog was, in fact, a service animal. It was surprisingly labor intensive to get the case dismissed. The guy said he had PTSD and made assertions about having trained the dog himself. Under the ADA, no particular credentialing or certification is required. The animal need only have “individualized training” to assist the individual with the individual’s disability. (This means that the training has to have some relation to particulars of the individual’s disability.)

I am concerned about existing legislation, IC 35-46-3-11.5 that defines “service animal” in a way that isn’t necessarily consistent with the federal definition under the Americans with Disabilities Act. This legislation uses the definition of service animal in IC 36-46-3-11.5. The inconsistencies could get people in trouble — if, for example, they rely on the state definition and end up violating the ADA as a result. Another problem, potentially, is that people aren’t going to know whether their own dog meets the definition of “service animal.” Perhaps they are disabled, but the training the dog receives isn’t related to that disability. Or maybe they misunderstand the distinction between emotional support animal and service animal and think that one of these mail away places that gives you ESA documentation is certifying that your dog is a service animal.

In any case, there seem to be  people who simply want to bring their pets places and are abusing the ADA regulations on service animals to do it. That’s something that ought to be addressed for the benefit of property owners and individuals with disabilities who have legitimate service animals.

Rep. Morrison has introduced HB 1085 which would prohibit employers from requiring an employee to implant, inject, or ingest a device into their body as a condition of employment. The employee would be eligible for attorney’s fees and damages in the case of a violation.

A quick Google search suggests that this is maybe somewhere above dystopian speculation and but below common problem. For example, a 2015 article from the BBC talks about a Swedish company that required microchips be planted in the palms of employee’s hands to access the business facilities. A 2017 article in the New York Times talks about a Wisconsin with a voluntary program where employee’s can get a chip in their finger that allows them to, for example, open doors and pay for meals in the cafeteria. That article suggests some of the potential abuses that could come later, e.g. to track the length of employees’ bathroom or lunch breaks.