HB 2784 originally increased claims jurisdiction from $3,500 to $7,000. The House Judiciary Committee cut this down to $4,500 on 2/12/10 and on 2/22/10 the House Finance Committee OK’ed the $4,500 threshold. It now goes to the full House.
For more details on the nearly dozen efforts to increase small claims throughout the U.S. this year, check out the Focus piece of Issue 4:6 here.
Overlawyered is the operative word. The world is so litigious you can’t go outside or do anything fun or start anything fun/creative without worry if you’ll get slap with a lawsuit like this: http://lawblog.legalmatch.com/2010/02/01/libel-suit-over-moldy-apartment-tweet-dropped/