Two states, Florida and Nevada, are making steady progress with self storage lien law legislation as other states are gearing up for or finalizing bills. Illinois and Tennessee all have lien law legislation in progress and just last week, Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper signed into law Senate Bill 11-039, which includes improvements to the state’s lien law for self storage operators.
Florida House Bill 459, which revises the notice requirements relating to lien enforcement and addresses limitations on liability, overcame two major hurdles this week, moving through the Civil Justice Subcommittees in the House and Senate. Objections from the newspaper lobby slowed the bill down and caused one component to be removed. Senate Bill SB 1772 deletes provisions relating to advertisement requirements and clarifies provisions relating to the right to create contractual liens and limitations on liability. It also revises notice requirements, allowing postal notice by First Class Mail with a certificate of mailing as well as e-mail notification.
The state’s lien laws have been challenged by the FSSA as being archaic, costing self storage operators hefty amounts and creating excessive steps to procedures.
“For example an operator would send out a certified letter, which often came back unsigned and then would have to reach the customer in various other ways, such as phone calls, e-mail, regular mail etc.,” said Robert Bret, executive director of the Florida Self Storage Association (FSSA). “Also, in many remote areas of Florida there isn’t a significant newspaper publication, and facilities would be required to spend large sums on ads in newspapers that didn’t necessarily reach their specific audience.”
In Nevada, Senate Bill 150 passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on April 15 improving the state’s self storage lien law and limiting operators’ liability regarding protected property. It now goes to the Senate floor for a vote. Championed by the Nevada Self Storage Association (NVSSA) with financial support from the national Self Storage Association (SSA) , the amended bill includes four key changes proposed by Senate Judiciary Chairperson Valerie Wiener:
1. The newspaper-advertisement requirement for publicizing lien sales, present in the existing law, has been re-added to the proposed bill. It requires an operator to publicize the sale once a week for two consecutive weeks in a local newspaper. Advertising on a "publically accessible Internet website" was added to this requirement as well.
2. Licensed tenants such as doctors, lawyers, realtors and stock brokers who store protected property―for example, data containing Social Security numbers or banking information―must send written notice to the appropriate state-licensure board that they're storing sensitive client information.
3. A step-by-step process for operators on how to dispose of protected property was added.
4. Tenants storing protected property must label the exterior of the containers holding the materials.
Sources Used:
“Florida Lien-Law Bill Amended, Approved by Subcommittee.” Inside Self-Storage. April 21, 2011.
“Amended Nevada Self-Storage Lien Bill Heads to Senate Floor; Association Plans Revisions.” Inside Self-Storage. April 21, 2011.