TxDOT Must Face Suit Over Damage to Private Property, Court Says

The Texas Department of Transportation will have to face a negligence lawsuit over the cutting of trees within a private property’s border, a state appeals court ruled.

The dispute centers on whether an independent contractor that cut trees within a private property’s border was a contractor or TxDOT’s employee.

The Selfs—Mark Self and Birgit Self—own a 170-acre tract of land that adjoins a farm-to-market road in rural Montague County, in north central Texas on the Oklahoma border, the court said. Texas holds a right-of-way easement there.

The Selfs replaced the fence outlining their property’s border three feet further inside their ...