No. HB 145
Filed under Legal.
Claims Against the Government; Increasing the statutory limits on the liability of the state and its agencies and subdivisions for tort claims; revising exceptions relating to instituting actions on tort claims against the state or one of its agencies or subdivisions; revising the period after which the failure of certain entities to make a final disposition of a claim shall be deemed a final denial of the claim for certain purposes; revising the statute of limitations for tort claims against the state or one of its agencies or subdivisions and exceptions thereto, etc.
Plain English Summary
AI-GENERATEDState and local governments must now pay injured people up to $350,000 per person and $500,000 per incident when they lose a lawsuit, up from $200,000 and $300,000.
Anyone hurt by a state or local agency must now notify it in writing within 18 months, not 3 years, before they're allowed to sue at all.
Most negligence lawsuits against the state must be filed within 2 years of the injury instead of 4, though medical malpractice and wrongful death claims keep their own separate deadlines.
One exception moves the other way: survivors of child sexual abuse can now sue at any time, with no notice deadline or filing deadline ever applying, reaching back to old cases still alive on October 1, 2026.
AIThe per-person payout cap for a tort claim against the state or a local government rises from $200,000 to $350,000, and the per-incident aggregate cap rises from $300,000 to $500,000. A separate statute covering private vendors under contract with the state, such as private prison operators, is rewritten to track this cap automatically instead of using its own fixed dollar figure.
AIAnyone who wants to sue the state or a local government must first notify the agency in writing within 18 months of the claim accruing, down from 3 years. Missing that window can bar the lawsuit entirely, since notice is a legal precondition to filing suit at all.
AIRestructures the statute of limitations into separate deadlines by claim type. Ordinary negligence actions must now be filed within 2 years of accrual instead of 4. Contribution, medical malpractice, and wrongful death claims keep their own existing deadlines under separate statutes; any other action gets 4 years.
AICreates an exception with no notice deadline and no filing deadline for claims arising from a violation of s. 794.011 where the victim was under 16 at the time of the act. It reaches backward to old conduct too, applying to any such claim that was not already time-barred as of October 1, 2026.
AIIf the state or an agency does not resolve a claim within 4 months of filing, down from 6 months, the claim is automatically treated as denied, letting the claimant proceed to sue sooner. Medical malpractice and wrongful death claims keep a separate 90-day period.
AIPreviously the clock only stopped running during the agency's review period for medical malpractice and wrongful death claims. Now every type of tort claim gets that pause, and it applies to all prospective defendants, not just the one the claimant originally notified.