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MDT-backed bill would remove narrative route descriptions and rely on right-of-way plans
Summary
House Bill 387, requested by MDT, would eliminate a separate narrative route description filed with county clerks and rely on detailed right-of-way plan sheets; MDT and a title-examiner/land-surveyor discussed whether title companies and indexing would still work without the narrative.
Representative Denise Baum introduced House Bill 387 at the request of the Montana Department of Transportation to remove the statutory requirement that agencies file a narrative route description with county clerk and recorder offices and instead rely on the detailed right-of-way plan.
"Right-of-way plans provide all the necessary information and details that identify and describe the parcels that are impacted by MDT's projects," Dustin Rous, highways and engineering administrator for MDT, told the committee. Rous said the narrative route description is duplicative and difficult to interpret and that the plan sheets contain the "meat and potatoes" — parcel boundaries, ownership, acreage and the project extents.
Questions from Representative Darling and others focused on whether title companies use the narrative description for indexing and title-plant searches. A witness with title-examiner and land-surveyor experience said the plan sheets are more useful than lengthy narrative descriptions and that title companies use the plan and then determine affected parcels during a title search. MDT representatives said removing the narrative would not change public notice requirements and that detailed plan sets and the title-abstracting process would continue to provide parcel-level detail.
Representative Baum asked for a do-pass recommendation. Vice Chair Bowne said she would offer an amendment to replace the word "description" with "right-of-way plan" on page 2. The committee closed the hearing and scheduled executive action on a later date.
No votes were recorded in committee during the hearing.
