NEW BANKRUPTCY RULE
disclosure requirements. For example,
paragraphs must be numbered and
labeled in bold type, and the form
must contain separate paragraphs for
the cure and maintenance of home
mortgages, payment of domestic
support obligations, treatment of
secured claims covered by the “hanging
paragraph” of Section 1325(a), and
surrender of property securing a claim.
A Local Form must also begin with a
paragraph calling attention to the fact
that the plan contains a nonstandard
provision, limits the amount of a
secured claim based on valuation of
the collateral, or avoids a lien.
The last paragraph of a Local Form
must
include
any
nonstandard
provisions, and must include a
statement that nonstandard provisions
placed elsewhere in the plan are void.
The form must also require a
certification by the debtor’s attorney
or unrepresented debtor that there are
no nonstandard provisions other than
those placed in the final paragraph.
Considering ‘Opt-Out Proposal.’
A proposed Chapter 13 plan form and
proposed amendments to nine related
rules were published for comment in
August 2013 (25 BBLR 1142, 8/22/13),
and then revisions were published in
August 2014.
At the fall 2015 meeting, the committee
approved a national plan form (Official
Form 113) and related amendments to
rules, but it voted to defer submitting
those items to the Standing Committee
to allow further consideration of an
“opt-out proposal.”
To contact the reporter on this story:
Diane Davis in Washington at ddavis@
bna.com
Various groups, including the National
Bankruptcy
Conference,
National
Conference of Bankruptcy Judges, and
the National Association of Consumer
Bankruptcy
Attorneys,
expressed
support for the opt-out proposal. Judge
Marvin Isgur of the U.S. Bankruptcy
Court for the Southern District of
Texas circulated the opt-out proposal
to the 144 bankruptcy judges who had
submitted a letter in 2014 opposing
a national plan form, and there was
general acceptance of Rules 3015 and
3015.1 among the group.
For More Information
Full text at: http://www.uscourts.gov/
rules-policies/proposed-amendmentspublished-public-comment
To contact the editor responsible for
this story: Jay Horowitz at jhorowitz@
bna.com
Reproduced
with
permission
from BNA’s Bankruptcy Law Reporter,
28 BBLR 853 (July 7, 2016). Copyright
2016 by The Bureau of National Affairs,
Inc. (800-372-1033) http://www.bna.
com.
The opt-out concept wasn’t included
in the 2013 and 2014 publications of
the rules. The committee wanted to
republish the rules for the public to
have a fair opportunity to express their
comments on the opt-out proposal.
The committee truncated the typical
schedule for comment from six months
to three months so that the form and
rules could potentially have an effective
date of Dec. 1, 2017.
National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys
Summer 2016
CONSUMER BANKRUPTCY JOURNAL
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