HB 25-RECREATIONAL LAND USE LIABILITY/ADV. POSS    4:41:20 PM CHAIR HUGGINS announced HB 25 to be up for consideration. REPRESENTATIVE PAUL SEATON, sponsor of HB 25, read the sponsor statement. He said it encourages expansion of recreational opportunities for Alaskans by protecting private landowners that allow free recreational use of their lands by raising the liability standard to "intentional, reckless or gross negligent misconduct". He related that currently land owners rely on the unimproved land statute, but it is problematic because the definition of what is improved and unimproved is not clear in the determinations that have come out of the courts. So, landowners are unable to really assess their liability when they allow recreational use of their land. This bill also protects landowners from adverse possession or prescriptive easement based on them giving free recreational use to recreational users. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON said that many people have testified favorably about this issue. 4:45:30 PM SENATOR STEVENS said other states have done similar things and asked how this bill compares to those. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON pointed out nine pages of documents about other states. Many have used the same tack. 4:46:19 PM SENATOR WIELECHOWSKI asked if recently passed legislation on adverse possession and prescriptive easements didn't apply to these lands. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON replied that a bill was passed limiting the state from taking land through eminent domain. He didn't think they had changed the adverse possession statutes recently. Prescriptive easement is more the case where someone claims the use of the land and can claim its use for the future. He pointed out that this bill applies only if the recreational use is for free. This does not apply if the use is for commercial purposes. SENATOR WAGONER commented that the legislature passed an adverse possession bill, called the "squatters' bill," three or four years ago. He thought that took care of all these concerns. CHAIR HUGGINS asked the status of airplanes taking off and landing in his back yard. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON replied that taking off and landing is not trespassing. If it is done for recreational purposes, that is defined in the statute, but does not include language about air fields. It expressly does not include boxing contests, sparring and wrestling matches or exhibitions, activities involving devices that are subject to the requirements of AS 05.20. He said he would have to check out which statute applied to air fields. CHAIR HUGGINS asked him to check that out because he has been asked that question multiple times. He asked if his backyard has a groomed area that someone would call a strip, is that covered in his bill under "improved". REPRESENTATIVE SEATON replied that under this bill it doesn't matter if it is improved or not, but it does matter if its recreational use is free or not. CHAIR HUGGINS asked what if the land is owned collectively. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON replied that the land would have to be privately owned, not publicly owned as with a municipality - and you can't charge for its use. 4:51:41 PM SENATOR STEVENS said they are trying to protect land owners and this doesn't protect them from any event. He asked what responsibility landowners have for maintenance. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON replied if someone has an attractive nuisance that he knows is dangerous, and a minor comes in and gets hurt, he can be liable. This bill adopts the same standard the state has for unimproved land and it is case-specific. 4:54:26 PM DAVE BRANN, Kachemak Nordic Ski Club member, said he had been involved in trail development and maintenance in Alaska for over 30 years and things are more difficult in the last 10 years due to smaller parcels of private property for recreational trails to go over. People want and need trails close to urban areas and liability concerns are problematic. "HB 25 does a great deal to solve those problems and make recreational use much more available and attractive to the local community members." 4:56:16 PM MILLI MARTIN, Homer, said she is also a member of the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly, and that it passed a resolution supporting HB 25. She noted that 45 other states have similar statutes. 4:57:46 PM CHAIR HUGGINS thanked her for serving on the assembly. DAVID STUTZER, Homer resident, said he has been working with his neighbors to provide easements to the ski club for the trail that crosses their land. He said this is a very good bill and would ease his neighbor's concerns about adverse possession and liability as discussed by Representative Seaton. He said with the growth of the state and development of areas around towns and cities, it becomes necessary to have trails across private land. This bill would allow people to give permission to use those lands without fear of liability except for gross negligence. 4:59:22 PM MICHAEL SCHNEIDER, Anchorage resident, said the issues in HB 25 have merit, but he has problems with the way it is written. Subsection (a) where it says a landowner need only to allow recreational activity - that language is too lose. Under (e)(1)(C) "charge" is defined as "a contribution in kind, service, or cash from a user if all of the contribution is used to improve access...." He said under that language someone could charge him $1,000 to hunt bear on their property and he could fall into a pit or some hazard that they knew about and unreasonably failed to warn him of. They could after the fact take his $1,000 and put it towards remediation of the problem and comply with the technical words of this statute. He did not want to give that sort of broad immunity to inappropriate circumstances. CHAIR HUGGINS asked him to get together with the sponsor. He agreed and apologized for not getting together with him before. He asked if he was representing himself. MR. SCHNEIDER replied that he has been a practicing attorney in Anchorage for 32 years mainly tort claims. He has been interested in acquiring free recreational access to property since he was 12 years old and he is speaking for himself. 5:02:36 PM CHAIR HUGGINS announced that he would hold the bill. REPRESENTATIVE SEATON added that abandoned aircraft landing areas are included in current immunity language if they are away from an improved structure. If they are near an improved structure, it may not qualify for the same immunity. So this bill clarifies that. CHAIR HUGGINS announced he would hold HB 25.