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Utah Senate approves measure allowing limited damages for wrongfully enjoining state projects
Summary
The Utah Senate passed a bill creating a cause of action to recover damages when state or federally approved projects are wrongfully enjoined, but senators debated the scope and potential chilling effect on citizens’ access to courts. Sponsors narrowed the bill during floor debate to require both state and federal approval before it applies.
Salt Lake City — The Utah Senate advanced legislation Thursday to allow state courts to assess costs and damages against parties who wrongfully enjoin state projects, a change supporters said closes a legal gap and opponents said could chill public challenges to government decisions.
Senator Bob Spencer, sponsor of Senate Bill 183, told colleagues the bill would let state agencies, contractors and workers recover damages when a lawsuit meant to stop a state or federally approved project fails. “This would allow state, or it would allow the construction project company, or it would allow individuals to go back and sue for the damages that have been caused,” Spencer said during floor debate.
Supporters pointed to lengthy public processes on projects such as the Legacy Highway and said the changes target litigants who file and then lose ‘‘frivolous’’ challenges that temporarily halt work. Spencer said he and the BLM had discussed the need for a remedy and that chambers of commerce and local governments had supported the approach.
Opponents argued the bill could limit citizens’ ability to contest government action in court. Senator Davis said the measure risked imposing a “chilling effect on a citizen’s ability to redress through the courts,” adding that the right to pursue judicial review should not be diminished.
Several senators pressed for narrower language. During debate the chamber adopted two technical amendments that require projects to be both state- and federally-approved before the new cause of action would apply, and removed a provision that would have given the statute retrospective effect. Spencer said those revisions addressed concerns raised in committee and on the floor.
After extended discussion and a call of the Senate, the body moved the bill to the third-reading calendar and later approved the measure for final passage; the final roll calls recorded passage by 21 ayes and 7 noes with one absent. The bill will be transmitted to the House for further consideration.
What’s next: SB183 will proceed to the Utah House; if enacted it will create a state-court remedy for damages tied to certain wrongful injunctions against projects that had received both state and federal approval.
