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Montana Senate Judiciary Committee takes up court injunction bills – Daily Montanan [1]

['Keila Szpaller', 'More From Author', '- January']

Date: 2023-01-14  

With winter approaching, one neighbor involved in a property dispute couldn’t protect a construction site because the court had issued an injunction, said Sen. Steve Fitzpatrick, R-Great Falls.

State statute says injunctions run for 10 days, but Fitzpatrick said they actually go on much longer, 60 days, maybe 100, sometimes more.

So the neighbor, his client at the time, couldn’t take action to secure the site, he said.

“I frankly thought it was outrageous, almost insulting to have a court do this to a citizen of the state of Montana,” Fitzpatrick said.

So Thursday, Fitzpatrick presented a couple of related bills to address problems he said he’s witnessed firsthand and learned other Montanans experience too. (The case in question has already been resolved, Fitzpatrick noted.)

Senate Bill 134 would tighten up the 10-day limit so it is, indeed, just 10 days if it’s not extended, Fitzpatrick said. Senate Bill 136 would make allowances for construction sites that need to be secured during an injunction.

A third bill, Senate Bill 135, was not related to the neighbor dispute. SB 135 says a court may not issue an injunction against an administrative rule before the rule itself is issued.

The last couple of years, Republican lawmakers have clashed with the judiciary in high profile disagreements, but the bills heard Thursday take smaller bites at changing court practices.

KTVH reported GOP leaders are working on a larger related bill, not yet heard, that would align the standard for an injunction with a stricter federal requirement.

At the hearing, no one testified for or against the bills, and Fitzpatrick turned down one idea, from Sen. Barry Usher, R-Billings, to impose a penalty on judges who don’t adhere to injunction timelines.

“Why can’t we hold them accountable here?” Usher said.

Fitzpatrick, though, said he thought the best solution was to have the orders expire, and if there’s a problem, people could take it to the Montana Supreme Court.

The bill notes an injunction is not enforceable after 10 days unless it’s extended, and a hearing must take place within 20 days the injunction first was granted.

The idea is to give people relief, not get even, Fitzgerald said: “I’m not interested in penalizing judges.”

SB 136 says if a construction site is enjoined, a person may still protect the property from damage and ensure it’s safe.

SB 135 came out of an injunction — a preliminary one, Fitzpatrick believes — on a litigated bill from the 2021 legislative session.

The law had directed the Secretary of State to prohibit paid ballot collection, and a judge enjoined the law.

But Fitzpatrick said the Secretary of State’s Office hadn’t even had a chance to write the administrative rule, as the legislature had directed it to do, so at the time, there was nothing to enjoin.

“There actually has to be an administrative rule before you can be enjoined from enforcing it,” Fitzpatrick said.

He said the legislation would govern rules from the Secretary of State’s Office, not other agencies, at this point. It would apply retroactively to Jan. 1, 2021, as proposed.

The committee didn’t take action last week on any of the bills.

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[1] Url: https://dailymontanan.com/2023/01/14/montana-senate-judiciary-committee-takes-up-court-injunction-bills/

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