The award-wining Owning Your Piece of Texas: Key Laws Texas Landowners Need to Know program will be held April 8 in Burnet.
The Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service event will run 9 a.m.-3 p.m. at the AgriLife Extension office in Burnet County, 607 N. Vandeveer St., Suite 100. Lunch will be provided.
The cost is $75 and advance registration is required for the event at https://tx.ag/AgLawEvents22. All attendees will receive a hard copy of the “Owning Your Piece of Texas: Top Laws Texas Landowners Need to Know” handbook.
“With springtime just around the corner, landowners often have questions about how to protect themselves from liability if someone is injured on their land,” said Tiffany Lashmet, J.D., AgriLife Extension agricultural law specialist, Amarillo.
The program will provide attendees with information on a broad number of common issues facing landowners from water law to eminent domain to landowner liability, fence law and more.
“We’ve seen the Texas Supreme Court hear arguments in two different eminent domain cases already this year,” Lashmet said.
She said there also was a major change to the rollback tax calculation for property taxes in 2021, and that will be among the topics discussed during the program.
“We are excited to bring the Owning Your Piece of Texas program to the Hill Country,” she said. “With so many new rural landowners in Central Texas, we know that this program can be an important tool to understand the rights and responsibilities related to land ownership.”
In addition to Lashmet, speakers will include Jim Bradbury, J.D., James D. Bradbury, PLLC, Austin; Blake Bennett, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension economist, Dallas; Jacob Merkord, J.D., Marrs Ellis and Hodge LLP, Austin; and Tim Milligan, Plateau Land and Wildlife Management, Austin.
Need-driven program for rural landowners
In 2018, Lashmet recognized that Texas landowners needed information about legal issues that affect their property, whether they were first-time landowners or multi-generational land stewards. She formed a team to provide rural landowners and agricultural producers with general guidance and education on key legal issues related to their property.
Once the course was developed, she wrote the “Owning Your Piece of Texas: Top Laws Texas Landowners Need to Know” handbook to accompany it.
“This is the only handbook of its kind that gathers such a broad range of topics in one place,” Lashmet said. “And it is written not for attorneys but rather for lay landowners.”
For those unable to attend in person, the online version of the course is available for $150. The next scheduled in-person event will be Sept. 12 in Fredericksburg.
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