Rural intersections sightline proposal to rack up edits

Lawmakers are tapping the brakes on a bill taking aim at dangerously overgrown rural intersections.

The legislation — sparked by tragedy — is now mired in liability worries. A House committee heard the bill Monday, but no vote was taken while lawmakers draft changes.

Sen. Mike Crider, R-Greenfield, authored Senate Bill 183 after his friends’ eldest son was killed.

Riley Settergren was just 17 years old when he died in a 2017 crash along a corn-fringed Hancock County road. The driver of an agricultural sprayer pulled further into an intersection to see better and struck the pickup truck in which he was a passenger.

“Riley was killed instantly,” father Jay Settergren told lawmakers Monday. “That should never have happened. These are preventable accidents.”

The Settergrens established a foundation in their son’s honor to aid local schools, athletic programs, families and more. But in 2019, it began producing signs cautioning drivers to watch out for farm machinery and coordinating their placement at dangerous intersections, often upon request.

Jay Settergren said the signs are as far north as Crown Point and as far south as Jeffersonville, and even out of state. But, he said, “We need to move to the next level, more than just asking everybody to watch out for one another.”

Senate Bill 183 would apply to any agricultural land located alongside local road intersections without traffic signals. A landowner or renter would be required to maintain a “line of sight triangle,” with two 55-foot legs stretching out from the intersection along each road and connected by a third leg.

They’d have to keep triangles clear of crops, other vegetation, signs, fences, and other obstructions that are more than three feet high. Trees within a triangle would have to be trimmed to keep “clear vision” for six feet above the road.

Units of government would send landowners or renters notice if they’re not compliant. And people involved in vehicle crashes resulting from blocked sightlines would be able to sue for damages.

In his Senate committee, Crider exempted “critical infrastructure” like utility poles; then, on the Senate’s floor, he added the notification requirement. But it was only ahead of the chamber’s Feb. 20 vote, he said, that opposition blew up.

“I find myself in the unenviable position of having a bill (that), all of a sudden, everybody hates,” Crider said at the time. He vowed to kill the measure unless he could resolve the complaints. Fellow Republicans argued the proposal unfairly singled out farmers, while others said they trusted Crider to make fixes.

Two weeks later, Crider told his House counterparts that he’s open to suggestions. Witnesses offered them.

Adam Novotney, an associate director of policy engagement for the Indiana Farm Bureau, said the notice requirement was too vague and didn’t include a timeline. He suggested certified mail as a method of notification.

But no edits to the lawsuit provision would likely satisfy the agricultural group, per Novotney. He said liability should be based on a case’s merits, not its “automatic assignment” to a landowner.

Some members have also asked if they’d get a break on their property tax assessments if the legislation bars them from planting crops close to intersections, Novotney said.

“I don’t mean to mix those together,” he added. “… assessment is certainly the least of a concern compared to a human life. But I think those are considerations that that are going to be coming out if we do some serious amending of this bill to get it in a good place.”

Chris Smith, deputy director for the Department of Natural Resources’ Land Management Team, said the agency also has concerns. It owns about 380 properties around the state, including rural areas.

DNR staff “try to manicure as best we can,” Smith told the committee, but manpower is a challenge. And management areas for some of the state’s 300 nature preserves “run right up to” county roads. Committee chair Rep. Jim Pressel asked if reducing the bill’s application from large triangles to right-of-way would resolve DNR’s concerns; Smith said it would.

Pressel, R-Rolling Prairie, withheld the bill from a vote.

He told the Capital Chronicle it would be back in two weeks, at the earliest — along with some possible edits.

The sightline triangles, he said, are “probably not going to exist,” and the legislation’s focus is expected to shift to right-of-way.

“You can’t build in a right-of-way. Why should we allow weeds, trees, crops over three foot tall to exist in that right-of-way also?” Pressel said. “And I think that’s a really small thing to ask for everyone’s safety. And I think that may be a simpler solution.”

Indiana Capital Chronicle is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Indiana Capital Chronicle maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Niki Kelly for questions: [email protected].