UPDATE: PA Senate Passes Fair Share Act - Act Now Expected to Become Law
The Pennsylvania Senate has passed its version of the Fair Share Act in a bill nearly identical to HB1, which easily passed the House in April. The House is expected to quickly move the bill to Governor Corbett, who is expected to sign it into law.
Proponents have been trying to pass broad-based liability reform in Pennsylvania for at least a decade. In fact, this will mark the third time that the Fair Share Act has passed the Pennsylvania General Assembly in the last nine (9) years. The first version of the Act passed in 2002, and was signed into law on June 19, 2002, by then-Governor Mark Schweiker. The Act was later ruled unconstitutional for violating the “Same Subject” rule (the 2002 version of the Act included not only a provision related to liability reform, but also a provision related to DNA sampling).
Even while the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was considering the constitutionality of the 2002 version, supporters passed a new version of the Act (minus the DNA sampling provision) through the full General Assembly in 2005. However, then-Governor Rendell quickly vetoed the 2005 version of the Fair Share Act.
