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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

State Lawmakers Asked to Create “I-35 Bridge Fund”

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Friday, August 24, 2007   

In Minnesota, state leaders are negotiating conditions for a special legislative session to consider flood relief and funding for transportation in view of the I-35 bridge collapse. Joe Crumley, president of the Minnesota Association for Justice, says leaders should also address the needs of bridge survivors and victims’ families.

"A 35-W Bridge Fund would provide a means to help those people who were injured in that disaster and also make up for the limitation on the state’s liability."

Crumley says that lawmakers should revisit the state’s liability laws, which limit compensation to victims with claims against the state.

"Despite the fact that the state appears to be one of the culpable parties and certainly was responsible for this bridge, it has some really severe limitations on its own liability. So, it’s very unlikely that the state would be obligated to pay anything more than $1 million to all these victims. This would be divided up, by 113 or whatever the total number is."

Crumley says state law also limits total victim settlements to $300,000 which does not adequately compensate in cases involving lifetime injury or loss of income.

Crumley believes state liability laws need to be revised to protect people who are injured.

"There’s a ten year Statute of Repose, which means any improvement to real estate -- like a bridge that gets built -- once ten years have gone by, the designer and the builder are off the hook. Now that may be fine for a car or a toaster, but not for a bridge that’s supposed to last 100 years, so that needs to lengthened or eliminated."

He says the law has to be fixed to prevent future injustices. State leaders are negotiating conditions for a special legislative session to take up flood relief and transportation infrastructure. There are also calls to update liability laws.


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