{"bills":[{"photos":{"featured":"https://assets.causes.com/bill/photo/hr373-114/featured_good-samaritan-search-and-recovery-act-1454545957.jpg","featured_large":"https://assets.causes.com/bill/photo/hr373-114/featured_large_good-samaritan-search-and-recovery-act-1454545957.jpg","shareable":"https://n.causes.com/share-images/bills/hr373-114.png"},"introduced_on":"2015-01-14","title_override":"Do Search-and-Rescue Teams Need Easier Access to Federal Lands?","summary_override":"

This bill would create an expedited process for search-and-rescue groups to get access to federal lands. \"Good Samaritan\" search-and-recovery missions — where this bill gets its name — are searches for one or more missing people who are believed to be dead when the search begins.

Federal agencies would not require an eligible organizations or people involved in these search-and-rescue missions to have liability insurance when accessing federal lands. However, search teams would have to acknowledge that they are unable to file a tort claim, that they're not employees of the federal government, and sign a waiver releasing the federal government from liability.

Federal agencies would have 48 hours to notify the person or organization making a request to conduct a search-and-recovery mission within 48 hours of the request being made. If they deny the request, the agency would have to explain why, plus any actions that the applicant could take to meet the requirements for approval.

","official_title":"To direct the Secretary of the Interior and Secretary of Agriculture to expedite access to certain Federal land under the administrative jurisdiction of each Secretary for good Samaritan search-and-recovery missions, and for other purposes.","short_title":"Good Samaritan Search and Recovery Act","popular_title":null,"short_summary":"(This measure has not been amended since it was passed by the House on April 28, 2015. The summary of that version is repeated here.)\n\nGood Samaritan Search and Recovery Act \n\n (Sec. 2) This bill directs the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to implement a process to provide eligible organizations and individuals expedited access to federal land to conduct good Samaritan search-and-recovery missions, which are searches for one or more missing individuals believed to be deceased at the time that the search is initiated.\n\nThe bill sets forth procedures for the approval or denial of requests made by eligible organizations or individuals to carry out a good Samaritan search-and-recovery mission.\n\n Interior and USDA shall develop search-and-recovery focused partnerships with search-and-recovery organizations to coordinate good Samaritan search-and-recovery missions, and expedite and accelerate mission efforts for missing individuals.","summarized":true,"cost":0,"cost_commentary":"A CBO cost estimate found that implementing this bill would have no impact on the federal budget. ","impact":"People missing on federal lands, individuals and organizations that would conduct a good Samaritan search and recovery mission, families and friends of the missing, federal agencies that oversee federal lands, the Secretary of Agriculture, and the Secretary of the Interior. ","argument_for":"Bureaucracy shouldn’t prevent volunteers — who are willing to absolve the federal government of liability — from searching for missing persons on federal lands. 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Do Search-and-Rescue Teams Need Easier Access to Federal Lands?