LLAW Executive Director Lana Venable
BATON ROUGE – Our insurance crisis highlights a broken civil justice system and Louisianans are demanding more fairness and predictability to lower costs and level the playing field. It’s no surprise that legal reform has emerged as the top issue during the current legislative session.
More than a dozen bills have passed in the House to effect much-needed reform, but only a handful have made it to the Senate. As the clock ticks on the session, it’s unlikely that most of these will see Senate action. For years, we have called for comprehensive legal reform, but that call has fallen on deaf ears. Legal reform is good public policy. A patchwork of watered-down laws will not move Louisiana forward, nor will it provide much-needed relief to our families and job creators.
In 2023 nearly 40,000 jobs were lost and residents lost more than $2.9 million in income attributable to lawsuit abuse. Every Louisianan pays a hidden “tort tax” of more than $1000 annually—double that amount in New Orleans. More than $240 million is lost in state government revenues each year. These costs become part of a cycle, increasing costs for everyone and resulting in reduced economic output.
Precedent-setting “nuclear verdicts” of $10 million+ are on the rise here, while the first industry-targeting coastal lawsuit stands as a bellwether for the remaining 41 in the queue. All of this has cemented Louisiana’s decades-long ranking on the Judicial Hellholes list of the country’s worst civil justice systems.
Recently, jaw-dropping damages were awarded to two individuals in two separate Louisiana cases totaling several hundreds of millions of dollars each. Earlier this year, a $745 million coastal lawsuit verdict in Plaquemines Parish was lauded by trial lawyers as an example for other states – and even other countries – to follow.
Following sweeping reforms decades ago, Texas continues to improve its civil justice system, including legislation to change how damages are recovered in civil actions during their current legislative session. Both Florida and Georgia enacted comprehensive reforms to limit lawsuit abuse and reduce consumer costs.
Time is running out in Louisiana. Arguably, the most important of these proposed reforms is medical transparency, giving juries the full picture about medical costs billed versus actually paid. Similar legislation was vetoed last year. It is now up to the Senate and Gov. Landry to determine what happens next. No more excuses—let’s get it done.
Venable is executive director of Louisiana Lawsuit Abuse Watch.
