Committee sends ag nuisance bill to Senate
A divided Oklahoma Senate Judiciary Committee supported a measure Tuesday that proposes capping noneconomic damages related to nuisance suits brought against agricultural operations in Oklahoma. House Bill 2373, co-authored by Sen. Julie Daniels, the committee's chair, adds language to existing statute that already provides oversight to such cases. The added language, if approved, would require a court or jury to determine non-economic damages separately from the amount of compensation for all other damages. It also would cap the amount of non-economic damages a plaintiff could get to three times the amount of compensatory damages, or $250,000, whichever is greater. In some states, significant nuisance lawsuits targeting local farming operations have been filed against both local operators and the companies that supply animals to them (called integrators). Measure supporters fear popularity for those types of lawsuits is catching on and worrysimilar cases could target Oklahoma's poultry, pork and beef farmers and their animal suppliers. Daniels, R-Bartlesville, said the measure (co-authored by State Rep. Mark McBride, R-Moore) is backed by all of Oklahoma's farming organizations, the Oklahoma State Chamber and the Oklahoma chapter of the National Federation of Independent Businesses. “Capping non-economic damages might help prevent some lawsuits that simply aim to shut down our agricultural operations,” Daniels said. “It is a way to make sure we can continue agricultural enterprises in Oklahoma, which are critical to our economy.” Supporters seeking approval of the measure point to ongoing court actions in North Carolina, where a blizzard of suits of that type have been combined into 20 cases with more than 500 plaintiffs. According to a federal appeal there filed in March by Murphy-Brown, a pork
integrator that is a subsidiary of Smithfield Foods, three trials have reached verdicts. In one, a jury awarded 10 plaintiffs more than $50 million in compensatory and punitive damages. In a second, two plaintiffs were awarded damages of $25 million. A third verdict awarded more than $473 million to a half-dozen plaintiffs. Those damages were limited by North Carolina state law, but attorneys for Murphy-Brown argue “repeated verdicts of this measure are crippling; no business could withstand an ongoing assault of this kind.” During the hearing, Daniels answered questions about whether such cases have been filed in Oklahoma (not yet), whether a suspicion exists that competent juries and judges couldn't reach just verdicts in any future cases based upon their facts and whether continued urban growth into rural areas could spark future suits of that nature. The proposed measure was opposed by the committee's three Democratic members, who expressed concerns that capping non-economic damages might not discourage nuisance activities and that Oklahoma judges and juries are qualified to determine appropriate damages in such cases without legislated caps. Existing law already defines what agricultural activities include and sets out that such activities are presumed not to be nuisances when they comply with federal, state and local laws and regulations, when they are consistently operated using good agricultural practices and when they are established prior to nearby nonagricultural activities. Daniels closed debate on the measure by assuring her committee colleagues she doesn't distrust juries or judges or worry the cap would pit rural Oklahoma farmers against urban neighbors. “This is a precautionary measure,” Daniels said, “intended to make sure we don't put our local farmers out of business by making the deeper-pocketed integrators carry so much in terms of economic and punitive damages that they are no longer able to operateand leave our state.” The measure advanced to the Senate by an 8-to-3 vote.