{"id":40281,"date":"2026-03-05T15:45:27","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T21:45:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=40281"},"modified":"2026-03-05T15:45:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T21:45:27","slug":"guardianship-requirements-client-cap-advanced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=40281","title":{"rendered":"Guardianship requirements, client cap advanced"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers gave first-round approval March 4 to a proposal that seeks to improve Nebraska\u2019s guardianship system.<\/p>\n

LB985, sponsored by Bennington Sen. Wendy DeBoer, would prohibit a private person from accepting appointment as a guardian or conservator if they already have 20 clients.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Wendy DeBoer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Under Nebraska law, a guardian is a court-appointed fiduciary responsible for making personal and medical decisions for a person who is unable to do so for themselves. A conservator is a court-appointed fiduciary responsible for managing a person\u2019s financial affairs and property.<\/p>\n

DeBoer said the cap would mirror the one already in place for the state\u2019s Office of Public Guardian, which serves as guardian when no alternative is available.<\/p>\n

In December of last year, she said, an alleged case of theft and abuse was made possible, in part, by the lack of a cap on how many clients a private guardian may serve.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe person under a guardianship essentially has no rights over their life,\u201d DeBoer said. \u201cThe guardian determines where the ward lives, the jobs they may or may not have [and] how to spend money, among other decisions. Putting someone under guardianship is an incredibly serious step and those under guardianship deserve some basic protections.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Judiciary Committee amendment, adopted 37-0, added provisions of LB1178, also introduced by DeBoer. Those provisions would:
\n\u2022 allow individuals under a guardianship or conservatorship to attend required hearings either virtually or in person;
\n\u2022 require guardians to make at least monthly monitoring visits, keep written records of those visits and maintain periodic contact with care providers; and
\n\u2022 authorize courts to award costs and reasonable attorney\u2019s fees in specified proceedings, payable either from the trust involved or by another party.<\/p>\n

Lincoln Sen. Carolyn Bosn, chairperson of the Judiciary Committee, spoke in favor of the bill and the amendment.<\/p>\n

\u201c[A] reasonable limitation on the number of wards ensures meaningful participation rights for wards and protected persons,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Following the 39-0 adoption of a DeBoer cleanup amendment, senators advanced LB985 to select file on a 39-0 vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers gave first-round approval March 4 to a proposal that seeks to improve Nebraska\u2019s guardianship system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36722,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[249],"class_list":["post-40281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-judiciary","tag-sen-wendy-deboer"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/UpdateBlogPhoto-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40281"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40281\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40283,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40281\/revisions\/40283"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}