Vote Recommendation | Economic Freedom | Property Rights | Personal Responsibility | Limited Government | Individual Liberty |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Neutral | Neutral | Neutral | Neutral | Neutral | Neutral |
Relating to guardianships, management trusts, and certain other procedures and proceedings for persons who are incapacitated.
No significant fiscal implication to the State is anticipated.
SB 626 would make a number of changes to guardianship laws. A few significant provisions are outlined below.
The bill would add the interpretation and administration of a testamentary or inter vivos trust in which a ward is an income or remainder beneficiary to the list of guardianship proceedings that a county with a court exercising original probate jurisdiction has jurisdiction over. Statutory probate courts in a county would also have jurisdiction over those proceedings.
SB 626 would recognize declarations from appointed guardians in addition to oaths and require guardianship case files to include all official declarations. It would outline the specific words required to be taken in the oath or declaration of a guardian. Wards would no longer have a right to have an attorney ad litem, appointed by the court, to investigate a complaint they have about their guardianship, but they do retain the right to have a court investigator or appointed guardian ad litem investigate their concerns about their guardianship.
The bill would
also change the requirement of claimant notice from being published in a
newspaper printed in a county to a newspaper of general circulation in a
county.
The bill
would clarify that all public sales of a ward’s real estate by a guardian would
be auctions. It would permit the auction to take place in any county in which
the real estate is located or take place in the county in which proceedings are
pending, if a court finds it advisable. Courts would have a presumption of
approving rather than confirming public and private sales of such real estate.
SB 626
would require notice to be given for an application for the creation of a trust
in the same manner as applications for guardianships. Management trusts for a
ward or incapacitated person would have to abide by new rules for termination.
The bill specifies requirements for payment from an estate to nonresident
creditors or foreign wards or incapacitated persons.
Texas Action is neutral on SB 626 as it makes administrative changes which do not appear to touch directly upon any of our Liberty Principles.