Prescriptive easement for water conveyance-attorney fees.

Plain English Breakdown

The official source material does not provide a detailed summary text for the bill.

Law About Water Rights and Legal Fees

The bill allows people to receive legal fees and expert witness costs if they win a case about water conveyance rights, clarifies the time needed for these rights, and sets when it starts.

What This Bill Does

• Allows people who win cases about prescriptive easements related to water conveyance to receive money for their lawyers and experts.
• Clarifies that someone needs to use a water conveyance under a claim of right for at least ten years to establish a prescriptive easement.

Who It Names or Affects

• People who have disputes over water conveyance rights.
• Lawyers and experts involved in these cases.

Terms To Know

Prescriptive easement

A legal right to use someone else's property, like a path or waterway, based on long-term use without permission but also without objection from the owner.

Attorney fees

Money paid to lawyers for their services in court cases.

Limits and Unknowns

• The bill did not pass and was not signed into law.
• It only applies to actions taken on or after July 1, 2026, which has passed without the bill becoming a law.

Current Bill Text

26LSO-0182
2026
STATE OF WYOMING
26LSO-0182
Numbered
2.0

HOUSE BILL NO. HB0079

Prescriptive easement for water conveyance-attorney fees.

Sponsored by: Select Water Committee

A BILL

for

AN ACT relating to property; authorizing attorney fees and expert witness fees for actions related to prescriptive easements as specified; clarifying the time period for a prescriptive easement; specifying applicability; and providing for an effective date.

Be It Enacted by the Legislature of the State of Wyoming:

Section 1.

W.S. 34
‑
1
‑
158(a)(intro) and by creating a new subsection (g) is amended to read:

34
‑
1
‑
158.

Prescriptive easement for water conveyance.

(a)

A prescriptive easement for a water conveyance may be established if a water user has used and maintained a water conveyance under a claim of right for a period of
not less than
ten (10) years during which the use has been:

(g)

In any action to enforce a prescriptive easement established under this section or to challenge the existence or exercise of a prescriptive easement asserted under this section, the court may award reasonable attorney fees and expert witness fees to the party who substantially prevailed in the action.

Section 2
.

This act shall apply to any action brought on or after July 1, 2026.

Section 3
.

This act is effective July 1, 2026
.

(END)

1
HB0079