Where: Lousiana
What has happened in Louisiana?
- 2018, Legislature rejected a push to allow fishing boats onto land that has any private ownership claim
- In 2018 Lousiana studied the issue in the Public Recreation Access Task Force
- In 2020, the Public Access Task Force report offers suggestions for regulation:
- BALANCE INTERESTS. Its recreation sportsmen VS. respect for landowners’ legitimate interests in “managing the use of their land and in the development of mineral rights associated with that land.”
- STATE FISCAL IMPACT.
- Don’t cut mineral tax revenues
- Don’t increase administrative costs for new access regimes from new access pathways
What would regulatory proposals look like?
- state government could buy recreational access servitudes from landowners
- give private landowners tax incentives to allow recreational access
- strengthen landowner immunity to lawsuits in exchange for allowing recreational use of their properties
- allow the state to negotiate permanent boundary settlements
- guarantee access to all surface waters that ebb and flow with the tide
- let landowners donate surface ownership of a tract of land to the state & reserve mineral rights in perpetuity
Minden Press Herald | Louisiana lawmakers try to balance property rights with public land use