By Lawrence R. Ahern, III, Brown & Ahern (Nashville, TN) Introduction Four bankruptcy-related bills were enacted during the 116th Congress and signed into law on August 23, 2019.1 The legislation affected both business and consumer cases. One bill, the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 (SBRA),2 deals on its face with a non-consumer topic. However, it will be of great...

By Henry E. Hildebrand, III, Chapter 13 Trustee (Nashville, TN) Chapter 13 debtor may exclude from disposable income amounts projected to be paid to an employer sponsored 401(k) where such payments are consistent with pre-filing contributions made to the retirement account. Davis v. Helbling, 2020 WL 2831172 (6th Cir. June 1, 2020) (Larsen) Case Summary In 2017, Camille Davis filed...

By Henry E. Hildebrand, III, Chapter 13 Standing Trustee (Nashville, TN) Section I. Student Loans, Part I Statutory Suggestions When the Commission asked participants to identify the most important issue in consumer bankruptcy, all three committees were told the same thing: the role of bankruptcy in the field of student loans. All three committees looked at the issue and proposed...

By Phil Lamos, Chief Legal Counsel, Office of the Chapter 13 Trustee Lauren A. Helbling (Cleveland, OH) Section 1322(b)(2) of the Bankruptcy Code states that a Chapter 13 plan may not modify a claim that is “secured only by a security interest in real property that is the debtor’s principal residence.” But the inverse of this statute is true; if...

By William Houston Brown, Editor/Adviser, Academy for Consumer Bankruptcy Education On December 18, 2019, the Supreme Court granted the City of Chicago’s petition for certiorari, 2019 WL 6880702, from the decision of the Seventh Circuit at 926 F.3d 916 (7th Cir. June 19, 2019). The Seventh Circuit’s decision was analyzed in a prior article on this website. In its decision,...

I am delighted to be in the inaugural class of the Tom Vaughn Memorial Internship Program for Sylvia Ford Brown, Chapter 13 Standing Trustee for the Western District of Tennessee in Memphis. I truly feel that this internship has been invaluable to the furtherance of my career and the expansion of my knowledge of bankruptcy.  I. A Little About Me...

By Professor Nancy Rapoport, University of Nevada Dear Readers: Regina Logsdon has just asked me a great question: In this new world of Zoom, is it okay to record meetings? Video and audio? Permission needed? Does it vary state to state? We are living in a new normal, and video conferencing will continue to be part of our lives even...