SENATE BILL: Freedom to Roam Act (Failed)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Jimmy do you have another amendment?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

For the love of crap

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

For the love of crap

[Former President tack50]

Ok, second try then

Motion for a final vote

[Esteemed Jimmy]

I object. The premise of the bill itself is dangerous and no supporter of it has reputed any of these points. And additionally this bill will hurt the environment as it will result in landowners clearing parts of their land just to show it is being developed and used.

Like I say, if you are doing nothing with the land, you should at the very least allow people to walk through it, assuming they aren't doing any harm. The property title is not going to get stripped from you.

That's not an answer though. Why should they be allowed to walk through it; isn't the purpose of private property to give owners the ability to control how it's used? It's a lot easier to just make trespassing illegal in the first place than to put it on the landowner to prove damage was caused and by who, so this law will easily be abused and lead to tons of littering, dumping, and damage. How do you know a landowner isn't doing something with the land? How does this effect premises liability in the event someone is injured on a landowners land, now that they are allowed to be on it? A lot of landowners use vacant land as a private hunting area during hunting seasons, so having people able to just walk through it especially during these times will negatively impact the landowner's purpose and use of the land. A big appeal of moving to a rural area is privacy, and a lot of houses are built on large parcels with forested land included, so why should the homeowner have to let people be on the land around their house and negate this.

The property title is not going to get stripped from you.

If you can't determine who can be on your own land or prevent trespassers from going on it, is that section really your land anymore?

[Mike Thick]

I had to think hard about this one, but ultimately I agree with Jimmy’s sentiments and will be voting against this bill. I don’t think it’s the federal government’s job to decide whether someone is “using” land properly, particularly for a purpose as trivial as allowing people to go for walks or camp on their property.

I live in an area extremely prone to wildfires, where a littered cigarette is all it takes for much of the unused land in question to go up in flames. Allowing unimpeded, unsupervised access to tons of private land will dramatically increase the danger these fires pose to my community and many others around the country — and even if people can be held “financially liable” for damage they do to property, most people can’t pay to rebuild dozens of houses destroyed in a wildfire, assuming it’s possible to figure out who’s responsible at all.

Furthermore, this raises some thorny legal questions: if people are guaranteed essentially unfettered access to some kinds of private land, but law enforcement is still barred from entering said land without a warrant, how are we supposed to prevent criminal activity that occurs out of plain view? Maybe there’s a perfectly good explanation for this, but I think there’s a reason cops do patrols of public parks at night: unsavory characters look for public spaces where they’re out of sight to do unsavory things. Seems like this bill could give them what they’re looking for, with even more protection from law enforcement.

[Former President tack50]

As for the law enforcement question Ted Bessell proposes, the answer is super simple; law enforcement  and police would also be allowed to enter, just like any other citizen. I don't think this would create any more shady drug deals or whatever.

While I said this on my opening statement (2 months ago lol), I will elaborate on what made me introduce this bill. After the stay at home orders were fully lifted, I started going on walks to keep some of my sanity during these troubled times. I live in a suburban area but there is certainly plenty of countryside to be enjoyed where I live.

I had a couple of instances where I was unable to keep my walks through the countryside because suddenly there was "private property" despite there being absolutely nothing along the way (I've been able to confirm this through high-res satellite images) and despite them being marked as public access paths on Google Maps. In one particular case this cost me a 1 hour detour.

I really don't think you should stop people from passing through a certain piece of land if you are not doing anything useful with it. If you own a forest of several hectares, and are using it for timber, or cultivation sure that is fine with me. If you own a parcel of land that you are not cultivating for a particular and justified reason that is also fine by me. But if there is a piece of land that is truly wild countryside and several hectares in size; what is the point of stopping people from walking in it?

So therefore, after thinking about it, if it helps; there could be some sort of "minimum parcel size" required for this bill to start being applied, so that if you own a piece of land that can be described more accurately as an "oversized garden" than as a plantation; sure this doesn't apply.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

So next steps, further amendments cloture motions?

[Former President tack50]

I don't think any amendments would solve anything so I motion for cloture.

If this fails I guess we can try tabling instead.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

A vote is now open on cloture motion, Senators please vote Aye, Nay, or Abstain.

[At-Large Senator LouisvilleThunder]

Aye

[Former President tack50]

Aye

[Esteemed Jimmy]

Aye

[Mike Thick]

Aye.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Aye

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Vote on Cloture for the Freedom to Roam Act:

Aye (5): Jimmy, LT, NC Yankee, Tack50 and Ted
Nay (0):

Abstain (0):

Didn't Vote (1): Devout Centrist.


Cloture has passed and a final vote is now open on this legislation, Senators please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Former President tack50]

Aye

[At-Large Senator LouisvilleThunder]

Nay

[Esteemed Jimmy]

Nay

[Devout Centrist]

Aye

[Mike Thick]

Nay

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Vote on the Freedom to Roam Act:

Aye (2): Devout Centrist and Tack50
Nay (3): Jimmy, LT and TedBessell
Abstain (0):

Didn't Vote (1): NC Yankee (perils of procrastination)

This bill has failed.