A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

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No Evidence Could Ever Exist That Would Change My Mind

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Sheila Kennedy and EMPAC have both written posts about an exchange Rep. Rokita had with a constituent on the subject of climate change that underscores why yesterday’s march in support of science is necessary. As Sheila quotes the constituent:

My question was “What evidence do you require in order to revise your opinion on climate change?”

His response was “No evidence could ever exist that would change my mind. It’s all Liberal science.”

Rokita’s response is the equivalent of a kid sticking his fingers in his ears and yelling, “LALALALA, I CAN’T HEAR YOU!!!”

I’m not going to naively tell you that science is purely objective and tell you it can’t be liberal or conservative. In a strict sense, that’s true. The scientific method is one where you create hypothesis that is testable and falsifiable with results that are observable and repeatable. In that sense, science is not liberal or conservative. However, scientific results can be complicated and nuanced, and people can absolutely cherry pick results or interpret them with motivated reasoning.

But to say that all climate change science is liberal science or to flatly say that there is no evidence that could change his mind amounts to zealotry. I’ve come across this sort of reaction before — not with respect to science, but just with respect to having a discussion or argument generally. A person feels something is true, they don’t trust my arguments, but they can’t articulate a reason why my reasoning is flawed. So, they say — in effect — “I don’t care what you say, I believe what I believe.” They don’t trust themselves to distinguish good reasoning from flawed reasoning and don’t want to be lead astray from what they feel to be the “truth” by a bunch of fancy lawyer talk. So you get that sort of refusal to articulate a set of standards that would change his mind.

Seems to me that a population with a healthy grounding in the scientific method and its flaws would be better able to engage with scientific observations without fear that they were getting snookered by half-truths. Science education doesn’t, of course, solve all problems. EMPAC suggests that we might have an Upton Sinclair problem: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!” But, perhaps a well-educated populace will recognize a public servant with an Upton Sinclair problem and adjust their vote accordingly.

Sheila’s post concludes:

As Neil DeGrasse Tyson likes to say, science is true whether we believe it or not. What he implies, but doesn’t say, is that rejecting reality is a prescription for disaster–and so is continuing to elect people who find science unacceptably “liberal.”

Or, as someone else succinctly and ominously put it, “Mother Nature bats last.”

<b>Update</b> Dave Bangert, writing for the Lafayette Journal & Courier has more on the exchange between Rep. Rokita and the constituent, Stacy Bogan.  Bangert quotes Bogan as asking, “What threshold of proof do you require in order to listen to scientists worldwide rather than listening to a handful of lawyers who are funded by fossil fuels?” Bangert then quotes Rokita’s response. The source of the quote isn’t clear from the context of Bangert’s column. So, I don’t know off hand if someone had a tape recorder running that was transcribed, Bangert is going from his own notes, or perhaps Rokita provided the information. It differs quite a bit from Sheila Kennedy’s quote of Bogan’s Facebook page recollecting the exchange.

Rokita is quoted as saying that we should rely on scientific methodology so we don’t have to trust the scientists themselves. But, insofar as it is responsive to Bogan’s question, the Rokita quote says:

[T]here’s all kind of questions in regard to the liberal scientists who come up with their research. . . . There is all kinds of discrepancy in the science that you quote. I’m not going to vote for policies that could disrupt our entire economy and do things just because of someone’s liberal hunches.

In response to a follow up question where Marc Hudson alludes to the idea that 99% of climate scientists are opposed to Rokita’s view of the matter and asks whether Rokita thinks that 99% of scientists are liberal, Rep. Rokita responded:

“Ninety-nine percent of the climate scientists haven’t been interviewed. Of the ones that have been polled, they’ve come up with their opinion. …

“I have looked into this issue. I have studied it. I’d be happy to be moved by evidence, but I’m not going to be moved by liberal opinion.”

So, we don’t have any kind of articulation of what sort of evidence Rep. Rokita would need in order to make the judgment that we need to take action to address climate change. We just know that he says he believes that there are “all kind of questions” and “all kinds of discrepancy” in the science done by liberal scientists whose liberal opinions will not move him.

United and Property

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There are a million hot takes on the United fiasco. Here’s a quick one from me.

United had legal rights concerning who was going to be transported on that airplane. The passenger they had hauled off by the police was presumably removed based on some variety of trespass.

It’s a good illustration that laws and, in particular, property laws are creatures of government, ultimately enforced by government employees — sometimes through use of force under color of law. “Small government” advocates who support strong enforcement of property rights aren’t really promoting “less” government so much as they are asking that government favor their priorities.

There is nothing bad or unusual about this, necessarily. Property rights are certainly a very valuable component of a functional society. Advocating that government favor your priorities is a core feature of democracy. But acknowledging that you’re not different from other members of the democracy promoting their priorities gets you into the messy business of having to argue about why your priorities are better than their priorities. The myth of small government or the conceit that property isn’t really government is an effort to let private property advocates avoid having to make that case.

100 Years Ago Today: Lafayette, We Are Here!

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America has joined forces with the Allied Powers, and what we have of blood and treasure are yours. Therefore it is that with loving pride we drape the colors in tribute of respect to this citizen of your great republic. And here and now, in the presence of the illustrious dead, we pledge our hearts and our honor in carrying this war to a successful issue. Lafayette, we are here!
—Col. Charles E. Stanton, July 4, 1917

Senate Joint Resolution declaring war with Germany

Stanton’s quote would come some months later, but a century ago, on April 6, 1917, the U.S. formally entered World War I on the side of the Allied Powers against Germany. The reference, of course, is to the Marquis de Lafayette, a General in the Revolutionary War and instrumental in obtaining the aid from France that secured our independence from the British. We were, in a sense, repaying the favor by coming to the aid of France in its hour of need.

World War I has been eclipsed in our public mind by World War II — which had more in the way of dramatic action and a better “good guys versus bad guys narrative.” But I tend to think that World War I is more instructive of how the world and the world at war really works. The mix of justified motives, crass self-interest, and inertial drift into horror is how wars seem to usually work. And it’s hard to overstate the horror of this war. War has always been plenty awful, but in World War I, we truly industrialized it. Human bodies were just fodder for the mechanical grinder. If you want an accessible but in depth historical overview of the War, I highly recommend Dan Carlin’s Blueprint for Armageddon series. His description of the hardships of trench warfare was particularly gripping.

World War I had been ravaging Europe since 1914. The U.S. had stayed out of the conflict. Public opinion was divided on which side it supported and whether to go to war or not. President Wilson campaigned for re-election in 1916 on the basis of having kept us out of war. But, as Germany became more desperate, it took measures that alienated the U.S. The 1915 sinking of the Lusitania, with U.S. passengers aboard, and the January 1917 Zimmerman telegram (promising Mexico its old U.S. territory if it went to war with the U.S. in the event that it broke its neutrality) are usually cited as instrumental in shifting public opinion and drawing the U.S. into the war.  It seems that Wilson also thought entering the war was necessary if the U.S. was to have a role in shaping the eventual peace. Compared to the other countries involved, the U.S. got off relatively lightly in terms of casualties, with 116,000 killed and 200,000  wounded. Entry into the war had a profound impact on the U.S. at home:

The home front saw a systematic mobilization of the entire population and the entire economy to produce the soldiers, food supplies, munitions, and money needed to win the war. Although the United States entered the war in 1917, there had been very little planning, or even recognition of the problems that the British and other Allies had to solve on their home fronts. As a result, the level of confusion was high in the first 12 months, then efficiency took control.[28]

Propaganda poster in World War I

The war came in the midst of the Progressive Era, when efficiency and expertise were highly valued. Therefore, the federal government set up a multitude of temporary agencies with 500,000 to 1,000,000 new employees to bring together the expertise necessary to redirect the economy into the production of munitions and food necessary for the war, as well as for propaganda purposes

In Indiana, and in the country generally, entry into World War I blunted the Progressive movement. Political interest was turned to campaigns for war support and “let loose a patriotic but intolerant spirit that demanded conformity and unanimity.”

Eugene Debs, the labor leader hailing from Terre Haute, was arrested on June 16, 1918 after he made a speech in Canton, Ohio, urging resistance to the draft. Charged with 10 counts of sedition, Debs was sentenced to 10 years. At his sentencing hearing, he made his famous statement:

Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.

President Wilson was happy to let him sit in jail, writing, “While the flower of American youth was pouring out its blood to vindicate the cause of civilization, this man, Debs, stood behind the lines sniping, attacking, and denouncing them….This man was a traitor to his country and he will never be pardoned during my administration”

World War I gave a boost to the long active Prohibition movement. Among other things, grain used for brewing was needed for the troops, and a lot of the brewers were German. There was a lot of anti-German sentiment in the nation, generally, and in Indiana. (For example,Germany, Indiana in Fulton County was renamed “Pershing.”) Former governor Frank Hanly was active on the lecture circuit, advocating prohibition. In 1918, he railed against the brewers, saying Hoosier Brewers had “the arrogance of the Hun.”

In 1918, the State passed state-wide prohibition. And, in 1919, it ratified the Eighteenth Amendment.  Said Billy Sunday, famous evangelist and former baseball player at that time based in Winona Lake, Indiana:

The reign of tears is over. The slums will soon only be a memory. We will turn our prisons into factories and  our jails into storehouses and corn-cribs. Men will walk upright now; women will smile, and the children will laugh. Hell will be forever for rent.

The jails did not close down, but many of the brewers did, among them Thieme and Wagner in Lafayette, Terre Haute Brewing Company, Madison Brewing Company, Peru Brewery and Tell City Brewing. There was a lot of corruption in Indiana, as elsewhere. As Prohibition wore on, the prohibitionists would make common cause with the Ku Klux Klan who shared their conservative politics and would use the machinery of the old White Cap organization, the Horse Thief Detective Association to enforce the prohibition laws.

Following the war which, itself, was hot on the heels of the Progressive movement and the Industrial Revolution, Americans generally and Hoosiers in particular would be bone weary of change raising the appeal of a return to “normalcy” and giving rise to the Klan who promised a return to the good old days.

But I suppose I digress. A century ago today, we were gearing up for war. Many of the most significant  consequences would be unintended.

Bangert on Ricker’s End-Run Around Liquor Laws

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Indiana's liquor laws will drive you to drink

Beer, glorious beer. So frosty* and delicious. Except on Sundays. (*Note: frostiness void where prohibited.)

Dave Bangert, writing for the Lafayette Journal & Courier, has a good column on the Rickers’ end-run around the state’s liquor laws. Rickers convenience stores found a loophole that let it sell cold beer at its locations. (Apparently selling just enough food to get a restaurant permit to allowed cold carry out.) After the exploit came to light, the House sprang into action to stop others from taking advantage — tacking a Rickers provision onto a Senate Bill. The House committee report is here. The committee report contains an “intent of the General Assembly” provision. That’s always a red-flag in Indiana legislation. The substantive provisions of the law should speak for themselves. If there is an “intent” provision, that’s an indication that the substance is weak. (The Indiana Law Blog notes that use of preambles is discouraged by Indiana’s legislative drafting manual.)

Bangert writes:

Consider Sunday sales of retail alcohol. Getting rid of Indiana’s Prohibition-throwback vestige of blue laws really should be the low-hanging piece of Indiana’s weird setup.

But there is no such thing as easy when it comes to the marriage of convenience and the sense of Indiana’s carry-out alcohol regulations. Sunday sales is a frequent fight at the Statehouse, ultimately gummed up with sympathy for true liquor stores none too keen on allowing the sales of beer, wine and whiskey a seventh day – especially when that extra day is one of the biggest for weekly grocery shopping.

. . .

Meanwhile, the General Assembly resigns itself to scolding state agencies that grant a taste of cold beer sales, no matter how closely a place such as Ricker’s followed the letter of the law to get it done. Lawmakers are left trying to explain their intent – in this case that “a restaurant within a grocery store, convenience store, specialty or gourmet food store, or drug store should not be given the privilege of selling cold beer or liquor for carryout” – while admitting they’re barely solving anything at all.

He offers a hint of optimism though, observing that – as with any struggle with alcohol – “the first step is admitting that you have a problem.”

I know it’s something of a tradition for people offering their opinions to get perspective from cab drivers. But, I haven’t been in a cab for awhile, so the best I can offer is “dudes I talked to while watching a high school baseball game.” They were generally amused and supportive of Rickers and didn’t think much of the General Assembly’s effort to tackle the situation.  I think liquor laws are so jacked up, we have a celebration of the anti-hero situation going on here. I’m not sure if it’s Robin Hood or Billy the Kid or what, but ultimately we have laws that don’t make sense and, so, aren’t respected. When that happens, there tends to be admiration for someone like Rickers who gets around the arbitrary intent of the law while complying with the letter.

Still, in the scheme of things, the liquor laws are more of a low-level irritant. I don’t know that there will be a big push to make the General Assembly change things in the face of some pretty entrenched interests. As with the fable of the Hound and the Hare, the public is only running for its dinner while the liquor stores are running for their lives.  I’m skeptical Indiana’s liquor law structure will change much. Probably it will just serve to be a drag on the General Assembly’s reputation (a phrase which, I recognize, makes for some easy jokes.)

Sen. Donnelly and Judge Gorsuch

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Apparently Sen. Donnelly is going to vote to confirm Judge Gorsuch to the Supreme Court seat left open when Justice Scalia died. There have been a lot of takes: Donnelly is a genius, Donnelly is going to get crushed, Democrats are taking the high road and will surely be rewarded. Anyway, here’s mine:

Judge Gorsuch seems perfectly competent but right wing. If George W. Bush had nominated him or if Justice Scalia’s seat had opened up during a Republican administration, there would be no controversy. But, it’s hard to escape the feeling that Senate Republicans are being rewarded for bad behavior. Their refusal to act on the nomination of Merrick Garland is the elephant in the room here, so to speak. That’s what puts Donnelly in a lose-lose position.

If he stands with a filibuster of Gorsuch’s nomination, the Senate probably changes its rules and confirms him with 51 votes. The idea that Sen. Donnelly and the Democrats will successfully filibuster Gorsuch until Trump nominates someone more palatable seems unlikely. On the other hand, I think it’s pie-in-the-sky to think many people are going to reward Sen. Donnelly or the Senate Democrats for not being obstructionists.  On the conservative side, those voters who would be likely to vote against Sen. Donnelly based on filibustering Gorsuch aren’t likely to vote for him based on his favorable Gorsuch vote. Meanwhile, liberals are angry because the Senate Republicans obstructed President Obama’s nomination and because the Trump administration is just horrible overall. Even if Sen. Donnelly’s vote is only conceding the inevitable, they will see it as a sign that Sen. Donnelly isn’t really on their side.

Ultimately, Sen. Donnelly is a Democratic Senator in a red state. He’s making a political calculation on what will hurt him less. I think it was a coin toss for him.

Knocking on Doors

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This blog has not, for years, been on any kind of reliable publication schedule. Sometimes, it’s three times per day, then I go a week without anything. That probably explains the longevity — I’ve not put any kind of pressure on myself. It hasn’t done much for readership levels. If I wanted a lot of readers, I’d post 3-5x per day on Daylight Saving Time, class basketball, and why this or that politician is truly a monster.

Anyway, I’m going through one of my ebbs — which is coming at an inopportune time since this we’re getting toward the end of session when the General Assembly tends to get into most of whatever pernicious nonsense it decides to bring upon itself. So, I thought I’d mention what was occupying me instead of seeing what the General Assembly was getting into in terms of abortion, religion, following the “education choice” will-o-the-wisp, and whatever else.

Under the state’s funding formula, West Lafayette is in the bottom 2% of schools in terms of state funding. In fact, since 1993, the state’s school funding choices have worked against West Lafayette schools at almost every turn.  However, we’re a community that values its education. So, in 2010, the people of the community stepped up and passed a local school funding referendum. Partially as a result of this, we have one of the best (arguably the best) school districts in the state. Under the state’s school funding referendum model, a community has to keep passing these things every 7 years or so if it wants to keep the funding in place. So, I’m taking part in an effort to keep the local funding in place. One of the things this requires is knocking on a lot of doors. I’ve never actually done any canvassing before. Turns out, it’s pretty enjoyable. It helps a lot that I believe in the cause and most people in the community seem to be supportive. Getting out and talking to people is, for the most part, energizing. And, this morning, I brought my daughter along as my wingman. She seems to have an aptitude for it. (I warned you all this was coming when she was two.)

So, that’s eating up quite a bit of free time. Coaching the kids’ soccer teams starts up next week, so I wouldn’t be surprised if things are a little quiet around here in April. For those of you in the West Lafayette School District, I encourage you to vote “yes” to the school funding question on May 2. If you want to learn more, volunteer, and/or spruce up your lawn with a sign, head on over to SupportRDP.com.

Trump has no Subutai and is unlikely to get one

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On twitter the other day, I injected myself into a conversation:

I’m no scholar of Mongol history, but my understanding is that Subutai was a remarkable general who was with Genghis from very early on in his conquests. Genghis conquered a huge empire, and Subutai was one of his key leaders. Part of what made Genghis so effective was his willingness to promote competence wherever he found it.

Trump has no skill in that arena. His businesses are closely held, family affairs that he runs in a paranoid and insular way. Nothing in his early administration suggests that he rewards and appreciates competence. I see that he plans to appoint his son-in-law to try to “lead a SWAT team to fix government.” He’s trying to mount a difficult campaign without generals who know their way around the battle field, and he lacks the temperament and good judgment he would need to acquire competent help.

Seven Years Ago Today: Vote for Obamacare in the House

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Chronology of Obamacare

I’m never sure whether to use a stock photo of medical stuff or a stock photo of money when I write these health care posts.

My old health care posts are suddenly relevant again. Seven years ago, on March 21, 2010, the House passed Obamacare. I had a post on the subject which reflected  a number of my thoughts following the more or less year long debate that led up to the passage of that legislation. As I said at the time, I didn’t think Obamacare was well designed but I didn’t think a well-designed system could pass Congress. And the status quo was awful and getting worse.

We’ve, once again, been hearing about how everything would be cool with the health care system if only the free market was unshackled. Here is why I’m all but certain that won’t work:

To date, nobody has been able to direct my attention to an example of a successful market-based system of health care; leading me to be skeptical of whether such a thing can exist. One country that sometimes comes up in this context is Singapore. However, while its system makes use of private insurance, it also ensures affordability largely through compulsory savings and price controls.

Singapore’s system uses a combination of compulsory savings from payroll deductions (funded by both employers and workers) a nationalized catastrophic health insurance plan, and government subsidies, as well as “actively regulating the supply and prices of healthcare services in the country” to keep costs in check[.]

Markets are very good at allocating resources. However, to function properly, it seems to me that buyers need to have good information and the ability to walk away from a transaction. That’s a problem in health care negotiations. Health care decisions involve analysis of medical information that’s generally beyond the understanding of most people. And, even if you can rely on your doctor or otherwise master the medical end of the decision making process, medical pricing is often ridiculously opaque. Try calling up half a dozen hospitals and trying to get the actual price of a hip replacement. Even if they’re willing to tell you, there are likely to be an array of prices depending on who’s asking. And those will be qualified prices because any number of contingencies can affect the price, even in the middle of the surgery. Then you have the problem of getting an insurer to be clear, up front, about the terms of the insuring contract and then honoring those terms after the fact. The insurer operates from a position of strength, collecting premiums for years when there are no significant health issues, then being able to withhold a determination of whether it’s going to pay for a procedure until after the procedure is complete. Finally, any negotiating options you have in the ordinary situation pretty much go out the window once you’re in an emergency situation. It’s like negotiating with a gun to your head.

At the time, we were spending We were spending 16% of our considerable GDP on health care already. We were spending twice as much per person on health care as other countries. We were already paying for something like 45% of those costs from public funds. And costs were increasing. (And no, despite what you may have heard, medical malpractice lawsuits weren’t the prime or even substantial cause of these increases.) Despite spending half as much, those other countries had health care results that are comparable or, in some cases, superior to the U.S.

Can we do better? Sure, almost every other industrialized country is. But, for ideological and venal reasons, Congress is not looking to copy systems that are already working better than ours was in 2010 or in 2017.

Trumpcare Plan and CBO Score Released

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Healthcare in America feels like an eternal struggle, both in terms of settling on a policy goal and in terms of actually getting healthcare when you’re sick. I’m a small business owner and so, in terms of healthcare, not much better than being self-employed. My options prior to the ACA were not great. I’ve never been in love with the ACA as it came through, but it seemed better overall than the pre-Obamacare options. I was paying more and didn’t have great coverage. But, as a matter of broader policy, more people were covered and, I got the sense that, personally, if I or a member of my family got really sick, we’d have a lot stronger of a safety net with the ACA than without.

Detractors oppose Obamacare for a variety of reasons and with different levels of ferocity. There are free-market purists. There are those who get indignant when they see benefits going to the “undeserving poor.” And, there are folks who can’t see anything but the insurance mandate. I’m sure there are other reasons, but those are the three broad categories.

I think the market purists are misguided, primarily because health care isn’t a widget and doesn’t respond well to market forces. Procedures that are relatively straight forward and mostly optional are the exception — things like cosmetic surgery and lasik eye surgery are probably examples where the market works well. But, for a lot of health care, procedures aren’t optional — so, it’s not an arm’s length transaction where the customer can reasonably just go without if he or she doesn’t have the money. The necessity of various tests and procedures aren’t something a layman can reasonably evaluate without the help of a professional. And the pricing is beyond opaque. Try getting a price quote on a hip replacement, let alone a weird murmur that’s making you feel dizzy. The ability to walk away from a bad deal, knowledge of the value of the product to one’s self, and a good idea of the price are all pretty critical in creating efficient market transactions. On the subject of markets, I’ve said before that I don’t think the “selling across state lines” approach is going to generate competition and better value. Rather, it’s going to result in a regulatory race to the bottom where, like credit card companies, health insurers are all going to locate in whichever state will try to land those insurance company jobs by offering the most pro-industry, anti-consumer laws.

Not liking Obamacare is one thing, but the fact is that it was passed to address a problem. Health care was becoming more out of reach for more and more people by the year. Other countries with a socialized approach to providing care have (broadly speaking) been able to generate better health outcomes while spending less overall money. (I’m willing to concede that, for the very wealthy, the U.S. probably offers the best health care.) Now we have the Trumpcare “replacement” offered by the Republicans in Congress. (Trump apparently doesn’t want his name attached to this — which is remarkable given the number of substandard products to which he’s eager to attach his name.) The Congressional Budget Office score is out, and it’s not pretty.

The Congressional Budget Office on Monday projected that the House leadership’s American Health Care Act would result in 24 million Americans losing their health insurance while raising premiums for those covered on the individual market. Their bill would lower federal deficits by $337 billion over 10 years, largely as a result of cuts to Medicaid that would reduce its enrollment by 14 million, according to the estimate. Average premiums would rise by as much as 20 percent in 2018 and 2019 before falling in later years.

The premiums would generally fall for young, healthier people and rise for older people who tend to have more health problems.

Democrats have focused on the fact that the proposed legislation would result in a tax cut for those making more than $250,000 per year and a significant tax cut for the very wealthy. It repeals certain Obamacare taxes for “couples making more than $250,000, like a 3.8 percent surtax on investment income and a 0.9 percent surtax on wages. . . . Repealing them would cost about $275 billion over the next decade; which is to say, it would transfer $275 billion from public-health spending to the richest 1 or 2 percent.”

Other provisions, like health savings accounts, are nice if you have a lot of extra cash and don’t have significant health problems. But, for most Americans, those are going to do little or nothing in terms of paying your serious medical bills.

I know I’ve barely scratched the surface here, and — in any event — I’m not your best resource for health care policy discussions. (For that, I’d recommend The Incidental Economist.) But, I’ve noticed over the years that memories fade and hyperlinks rot. So, it’s been useful to hit the highlights on my own blog where I can generally find it again as the years pass.

 

SB 121: Adverse Possession for Non-Profits

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I was going to use a picture of an animated doll and make a joke about how I was referring to a different kind of adverse possession. But that seemed creepy, so I didn’t. You’re welcome.

Sen. Koch has introduced SB 121 regarding adverse possession. Adverse possession is a somewhat odd but venerable concept in real estate law that essentially says that if you use someone else’s real estate long enough and they let you, it becomes yours.  One can imagine, in days of yore, an absentee landowner with vast tracts of land who was so inattentive that someone else farmed it for a decade or two without noticing. In that case, maybe it’s best that someone doing something productive with the land becomes the owner. I don’t know if that’s exactly how the concept became enshrined in our law, but I think it’s probably pretty close.

In any case, there is now a formula of elements that have to be present before land can be adversely possessed. The elements are sometimes framed in different ways, but they include the fact that the possession must be open, actual, continuous for ten years or more, and adverse to the person who holds title to the land.  There is another requirement that the legislature added to the common law element in the 1920s: a person claiming possession has to pay taxes on the land for that period. Often this element gets fudged a bit — in that, a fair amount of adverse possession takes place around the edges: say, you put up a fence that goes over your property line into the neighbor’s real estate. You don’t pay any more for the extra land, but you (and the government) think you’re paying what you owe. In that case, the taxation element will be satisfied. But, if you squat on a random tract of land, don’t get kicked off but don’t pay taxes, you won’t acquire the land.

There is an exception to the taxation element currently in place for governmental entities – presumably on the assumption that they wouldn’t normally have to pay real estate taxes in any case, so it shouldn’t be an element of adverse possession for those entities. SB 121 extends that logic to “501” entities who wouldn’t be required to pay taxes to enjoy adverse possession. (The number “501” comes from section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code where you’ll find various types of tax-exempt organizations, such as the 501(c)(3) charitable organizations.)

This certainly isn’t my area of expertise, but I think this goes a little too far. I understand the logic, but I think the 501 entities still generally have to pay taxes on real estate if it isn’t being used for an exempt purpose. (Maybe a generally charitable organization has property that it’s using for straight up profiteering. Maybe a church opens a gym and makes money off of membership fees.) So, I’d be inclined to recommend an exempt purpose requirement to get the 501 entity out from under the tax payment requirements.