Paul Blume's Columns - Inciting new riots: Immunity vs. state lines (May 2009)

First, I need to say something about Mary Margaret, the world’s most excellent canine (just ask her). When I say I “need” to say something about her, her name hasn’t been mentioned here for the last several columns, and she knows it, and she’s not happy about it. At all.

Mary Margaret, as most long-term readers of this column know (if, indeed, I have some), is a white Labrador Retriever. Well, she’s mixed: half Lab and half attitude. She is now lobbying for some sort of a medal. Large and gold. She deserves the medal because she is allowing a small dog – a Morkie named Gidget – to live in her house without eating the Morkie. A Morkie is a mix of a Maltese and a Yorkshire Terrier (“Yorkie”) and which goes from place to place at near or above the speed of light. I think a Morkie should be named “Mindy,” but no one pays attention to me.

Gidget is very small, about six pounds (avoirdupois), and she loves Mary Margaret. She shows that by eating Mary’s food, by jumping up and down to lick Mary Margaret in the face, and by trying to steal any treat Mary Margaret might obtain for conducting personal business outside. Gidget is in Mary Margaret’s home because she belongs to our younger daughter who is living with us till she finds her own place. Mary Margaret is checking the classifieds every day and marking likely places.

So. There. I’m okay with the Wonder Pooch for a little while, anyway.

Some time back, I wrote a column about immunity from liability which schools and their Boards and employees enjoy due to an excellent statute, A.C.A. §21-9-301. Suppose one of your employees causes injury or property damage due to negligence (think about leaving a large, deep hole in a playground and someone falls into it). Unfortunate, but the victim of the fall may not obtain money damages from either the school employee responsible for digging the hole or the person responsible for seeing to it that no dangerous holes are on school property. The school district and the Board and all your employees are covered by that statute. Cool.

Well, then, what happens if school folks, including your students, go into another state on school business? Very bad things. Specifically, immunity applies only in Arkansas, so if a school employee breaks something or someone because of negligence, you’re probably going to be sued. And if money damages are assessed, that money probably comes out of your operating funds.

Let’s say that you send your cheerleaders to Alabama for a competition. Then let’s say that your cheerleaders drop water balloons from the tenth floor of their hotel on attendees of a convention of 90-year-olds who are milling about on the sidewalk below. Why is your school potentially liable? It’s called “negligent supervision,” meaning that the folks who are supposed to keep the cheerleaders from committing torts weren’t doing their job. That means money for the wet, stunned nonagenarians, money from your school.

When I wrote about this earlier, there was rioting with people running around, screaming and waving their arms in the air. (It looked like scenes from “The Day the Earth Stood Still.” The original one from the 1950s, not the new one. Klaatu barada nikto). Think about your school’s field trips for students and senior trips. Athletic contests in some state other than our own. Ugly.

At that time, I recommended that you seek insurance for such special events, but when I asked a large insurance broker about such coverage, I was told that no such coverage was available. That was incorrect. Wrong. Simply not true.

Recently I asked the ASBA’s own Insurance Guru, Shannon Moore. “Not a problem,” she said, made a phone call or two, and informed me that such coverage is, after all, quite available through our Risk Management Program. (You don’t have to be a member of the Program, but you should be, regardless. And no, I don’t get any compensation from them. Although [ahem] I should. Mary Margaret says so).

So if you’re going to have a trip out of state, say a senior trip, or a field trip, you have a choice of rolling the dice or getting a policy of insurance, “special events coverage,” with the understanding that, regardless of your chaperones’ best efforts, kids will be tortfeasors.

If you want to insure your school’s escapades across state lines, call Insurance Guru Shannon Moore at the ASBA office and tell her what you need. More than likely, she can come up with something to put your mind at ease, for not a whole lot of money. Certainly for a lot less money than you might have to pull out of your school’s funds if your cheerleaders or chess club members get a little crazy.

Until next time, Mary Margaret said to tell everyone hello. And treats are accepted. Petting is good, too. Medals are best.

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