By Ellis                                              S.C.R. No. 21
         76R2081 RVH-D                           
                                CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
 1-1           WHEREAS, Significant differences between the current fee for
 1-2     filing a multiple-party civil lawsuit in a district, county, or
 1-3     appellate court, a party's ability to pay, and the actual court
 1-4     costs associated with such suits have raised concerns about the
 1-5     appropriateness of such fees and raise the question of whether the
 1-6     filing fee rate should be reassessed in light of those concerns;
 1-7     and
 1-8           WHEREAS, On average, filing fees pay for approximately 40
 1-9     percent of the costs associated with court proceedings, records
1-10     preservation, and other clerical duties; and
1-11           WHEREAS, Regardless of whether a court hears a lawsuit that
1-12     involves one plaintiff or a multiple-party or class action lawsuit
1-13     that involves hundreds or, in some cases, thousands of plaintiffs,
1-14     the filing fee for the one plaintiff and the group of plaintiffs is
1-15     the same, despite the greater recordkeeping burden imposed on the
1-16     court by a multiple-party lawsuit, in which case the majority of
1-17     the clerical costs are borne by the court at taxpayer expense; and
1-18           WHEREAS, The County and District Clerk's Association of Texas
1-19     has recommended that courts be allowed to charge separate fees for
1-20     each party in a multiple-party lawsuit to help ease the cost burden
1-21     of maintaining individual plaintiff files, while the Texas Trial
1-22     Lawyers Association, concerned with fees becoming hardships for
1-23     individuals, favors reducing fees or setting a standard fee for
1-24     multiple-party lawsuits; and
 2-1           WHEREAS, The increasing number of civil court filing fees and
 2-2     attendant concerns that court costs may restrict citizens' access
 2-3     to the courts or that taxpayers may be asked to bear a greater
 2-4     share of the cost burden have created a situation where it has
 2-5     become necessary to determine whether court costs are unreasonable
 2-6     or overly burdensome and how fees may be brought in line with those
 2-7     costs; now, therefore, be it
 2-8           RESOLVED, That the 76th Legislature of the State of Texas
 2-9     hereby direct the Office of Court Administration to report on the
2-10     costs of filing multiple-party lawsuits and the feasibility of
2-11     using sliding scales or aggregate filing fees and to submit
2-12     recommendations to the legislature no later than March 1, 1999;
2-13     and, be it further
2-14           RESOLVED, That the secretary of state forward an official
2-15     copy of this resolution to the director of the  Office of Court
2-16     Administration.