01-11-1993 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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LEAGUE OF MM CITIES TEL :612-490-96S6 Jan 08 93 No.005 P.02 ' •«>#*- • ^ • • . 1 * •. *• •-♦i r-,V •, f . - - •• • • > • •• ■ . V.*. ..V *Z • *•- i!».••• , - 1. ; I- • * ' * • • • t • -• • *•-. k ... / r •' i-- r-: 9, BXCE8B LIABILITY COVERAGE LIMITS What can ao wrong Th# Btatuta* limit th« ciiy's tort liability to $600,000 par occurranoa* UlCIT providaa a standard $600,000 liability covara^a limit to match tha statutory limit. Howaver, thara ara ••varal ways in which that covara^B could turn out not to ba anough. For axampla: - Th* atatutory limits don't apply to some of the city's liability axpoauras. Soma possible examples are liability under tha federal civil rights laws; liability assumed by contract; liability for actions in another state (under an inter•state mutual aid agreement, or while a city officer is attending an out-of-state conference, t' example); or inverse condemnation liability for land v a regulation actions. - The mciT liability coverage includes annual aggregate limits on the products liability coverage, the limited pollution liability coverage, and the land use liability coverage* If the city should experience more than one liability incident in one of these areas in a single year, the city'e tMCIT coverage might not cover the full extent of the city's liability under the statute. - Although the statutory liability limits have now been lasted several times in court and have been upheld, it is still conceivable that the courts might someday change their minds and hold the municipal tort liability limits unoonstitutlonol. All of these represent ways In which the city could conceivably end up with more liability than it has coverage, so, the city would have to bear the excess from its own r-jaources. There's another issue too that some view as a proj-lem. The tort liability limits literally mean that if an Injured individual's ppcvan damages exceed the statutory limits, he will not be fully reimbursed for the damage he has suffered because of the city's fiagligence* Since the statutes include a •'per-occurrence*' limit as well ee a ••per-cloimant" limit, an individual's reimbursement could be eeverely limited if a number of other people were also Injured in the same incident. B.g., if 60 people were injured in a single incident - say a bleacher collapaes, or a city vehicle hits a school bus full of kids - there could be as little as $10,000 available under the statutory limits to compensate each person. In other worde, the statutory liability l_mlfes mean that sometimes an indivxotal will not be fully compensated for the damage the city has caused. I i I