HALT Executive Director James C. Turner and Senior Counsel Thomas M. Gordon (standing 2nd & 3rd from left) at April 22, 2003 Maryland small claims reform bill signing ceremony.

HALT's three-year effort to raise the small claims jurisdictional limit in Maryland has succeeded, as the state has raised its ceiling on small claims from $2,500 to $5,000. Senate Bill 4, enacting the increase, was signed into law on April 22, at a bill-signing ceremony at the State House in Annapolis attended by HALT Executive Director James C. Turner and Senior Counsel Thomas M. Gordon.

HALT's involvement with this legislation began in 2001, when a similar bill was introduced in the Maryland House by (now-retired) Delegate Robert Baldwin of Anne Arundel County. HALT worked closely with Delegate Baldwin towards passage of the measure and testified in support of the bill before the House Judiciary Committee. Although the bill was unanimously passed by both houses of the legislature in both 2001 and 2002, it was vetoed by then-Governor Parris Glendening. Glendening cited a request of the state's trial lawyers as the reason for his veto.

In 2003, HALT again set out to promote an increase in small claims jurisdiction, this time, working with Senator Janet Greenip of Anne Arundel County. HALT's testimony before the Senate Committee on Judicial Proceedings was well-received, and the bill again unanimously passed in both houses. Governor Robert Ehrlich signed the bill into law at the April 22 ceremony, raising the state's small claims ceiling from the eighth-lowest in the country to just above the national median of $4,500. The increase takes effect on October 1, 2003.