Life in a Small Town Law Office

The First Thing to Consider BEFORE Your Auto Accident!

Timothy Belcher — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 02:48:18 +0000

Recently there has been a number of auto accidents on US 460 between Elkhorn City, Kentucky and Pikeville. I drive US 460 on a daily basis . Over the past 21 years as a lawyer who has handled hundreds of auto accident cases, I am attuned to these accidents and how they happen and this makes my concerns very personal.

Before you are involved in an auto accident there are a number of things you should do to make sure you and your family is protected. First and foremost you should take out your auto insurance policy and take a look at your coverages. You can quickly find your coverages by looking at the declarations page of your policy. It is usually, found in the first five pages of your policy when your insurance company sends it to you.

The first coverage to look at is added reparations benefits (PIP) on your automobile policy. Every auto policy in Kentucky comes with Basic Reparations Benefits also called Personal Injury Protection or PIP benefits. Kentucky requires basic PIP coverage on all motor vehicles except motorcycles. Basic PIP is to be paid by the insurer of the vehicle in which the injured person is riding at the time of an accident, or the vehicle which strikes a pedestrian, regardless of who was at fault in the accident. Basic PIP provides up to $10,000 per person per accident for medical expenses, lost wages and similar “out of pocket” costs due to an injury.

Here is a list of the things that PIP will pay for if you are in an auto accident.

KRS 304.39-020(5) is the Kentucky law what types of basic PIP benefits are paid.

“(a) “Medical expense” means reasonable charges incurred for reasonably needed products, services, and accommodations, including those for medical care, physical rehabilitation, rehabilitative occupational training, licensed ambulance services, and other remedial treatment and care. “Medical expense” may include non-medical remedial treatment rendered in accordance with a recognized religious method of healing. … Medical expense shall include all healing arts professions licensed by the Commonwealth of Kentucky. There shall be a presumption that any medical bill submitted is reasonable.

(b) “Work loss” means loss of income from work the injured person would probably have performed if he had not been injured, and expenses reasonably

incurred by him in obtaining services in lieu of those he would have performed for income, reduced by any income from substitute work actually performed by him.

(c) “Replacement services loss” means expenses reasonably incurred in obtaining ordinary and necessary services in lieu of those the injured person would have performed, not for income but for the benefit of himself or his family, if he had not been injured.

(d) “Survivor’s economic loss” means loss after decedent’s death of contributions of things of economic value to his survivors, not including services they would have received from the decedent if he had not suffered the fatal injury, less expenses of the survivors avoided by reason of decedent’s death.

(e) “Survivor’s replacement services loss” means expenses reasonably incurred by survivors after decedent’s death in obtaining ordinary and necessary services in lieu of those the decedent would have performed for their benefit if he had not suffered the fatal injury, less expenses of the survivors avoided by reason of the decedent’s death and not subtracted in calculating survivor’s economic

loss.”

Here are the DO’s and DO NOT’S regarding your PIP coverage.

DO NOT take a deductible on your PIP benefits. It is not worth the money you save.

DO purchase PIP on your motorcycle.

DO purchase added reparations benefits in $10,000.00 increments up to $50,000.00 dollars.

Call your insurance agent and have them price all the above options for you. It could end up being the best money you ever spent.

Coal Truck Accidents -Get the evidence quickly! (timbelcher.wordpress.com)
Kentucky Auto Insurance – Buying vs. Rejecting Personal Injury Protection (articles.onlineautoinsurance.com)
Accident Injury Care in Utah: Chiropractors and Massage Therapists (getbalancedhealth.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Community, Elkhorn City, Law

2011 in review

Timothy Belcher — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 16:38:16 +0000

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 3,700 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 3 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Filed under: Uncategorized

New Swift Silver Mine Book Published

Timothy Belcher — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 15:43:31 +0000

Ed Henson has just written a great new book on the John Swift Silver Mine. It is a fictional novel based on the legend. Here is a link to get Swift on Amazon

Here is theSwift“> link for the Kindle edition of the book

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Filed under: Uncategorized

Coal Truck Accidents -Get the evidence quickly!

Timothy Belcher — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 00:29:14 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

There are a number of things you should consider if you or a loved one is involved in a collision with a Tractor-Trailer or Coal Truck. First and foremost, Evidence needs to be collected quickly and it is the last thing a accident victim or his or her family thinks about. You can be assured that the trucking company and their insurance carriers routinely get to the accident scene before it is even cleared by the police.

In eastern Kentucky almost every coal truck has at least one million dollars in insurance coverage so there is a lot at stake for the insurance company.

It is important that the victim have a trial lawyer with a thorough knowledge of trucking accidents. The trial lawyer should collect the following items as soon as possible:

the complete police investigation file, including all photographs and video;
the 911 recordings or tapes;
all the television and news media converge, including all the photograghs taken at the scene by reporters. (Reporters often take a large amount of photos when covering a story which are never published by their media outlet)
all the black box data downloads from the crashed autos and truck;

There are numerous other items that need to be collected and reviewed, but the main point here is to be thinking about getting all the curcial evidence as quickly as possible.

Most attorneys have had little or no experience in operating or maintaining commercial vehicles. That is why it is important that the attorney retain a truck safety expert as soon as possible. A well trained, experienced commercial vehicle operator can provide crucial insight into helping structure the discovery requests, and can familiarize the attorney with the various aspects of commercial vehicle maintenance and operation. There are numerous accident reconstructionists who have obtained CDLs, but nothing can take the place of someone who has logged thousands of hours behind the wheel. Truck Safety Experts are also very helpful at trial as most jurors have a poor understanding of commercial vehicle operation, and the safety duties imposed upon truck drivers and motor carriers.

In my 20 plus year of litigation I have been involved in numerous tractor trailer and coal truck accident cases and the main lessons learned is always get the evidence and get it quickly!

Filed under: Uncategorized

Use Evernote for your Closing Argument “swipe file”

Timothy Belcher — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 21:52:28 +0000

I use Evernote for a lot of different things in my daily personal and business life. This post is about one of the first ways I began using Evernote.

What is a Swipe File?

A Swipe File is a large collection of reference materials to help in the creative process. Wikipedia defines, ”A swipe file is a collection of tested and proven advertising and sales letters. Keeping a swipe file (templates) is a common practice used by advertising copywriters and creative directors as a ready reference of ideas for projects. Copywriters are not the only ones who can benefit from having a swipe file. … authors and publishers can benefit from creating a swipe file of best-selling titles to give them ideas for their own titles. Publicists can create a swipe file of great press release headlines. Swipe files are a great jumping-off point for anybody who needs to come up with lots of ideas…”

Trial Lawyers use of Swipe File

All Trial Lawyers should use a swipe file for capturing ideas, analogies and inspirations regarding specific cases as they progress. These bits of information could be anything form a relevant news story to a magazine article or an advertisement of corporate defendant.

For years I used a regular file folder in the client file to keep these bits of inspiration. However, this was often a complex task. Most of the time when inspiration hit I never had that client file in front of me. I would have to dictate into a recorder or scribble a note out on a piece of paper and then place it in the file at a later date.

Why Evernote is the tool for your “Swipe File”

I began using Evernote in October of 2009. One of my first uses of Evernote was to capture notes and ideas for trial. Now I have all my witness outlines, cross-examination outlines, and my master swipe file on Evernote. I can get the information into Evernote in numerous ways.

I can use Noteshelf on my iPad and actually write it down and export the note to Evernote straight from Noteshelf.
If I write it on paper, I scan the paper with my Scansnap scanner directly into Evernote.
If I am surfing the web and doing research and I find something relevant to a case I can use Evernote web clipper in Firefox or Google Chrome.
I can also use my phone to take a picture of a document or object directly in Evernote on the phone.
I can also use the Evernote app on my phone to dictate an audio note directly into Evernote.
Evernote also provides each account with a unique email address so you can forward email straight into Evernote.
I can also just open a new note in Evernote and begin typing the idea or thought directly into Evernote. (I actually wrote this blog post in Evernote)

Once the information is in Evernote you can easily find it with Evernote’s search function. It will even search your hand writing. However, for my swipe file I tag the note with ”swipe file” “Client’s Name” (if needed) and the area I think I will need to use the information. For Example if it is an idea for closing argument, I will add the tag “closing.” You create your own notebooks and tags in Evernote so how you organize it is completely up to you.

Evernote is free for the first 60 Mg of data for every 30 day cycle, but you can upgrade to the premium account. Personally, I have never needed to upgrade, but I can see it happening soon because I use Evernote for everything!

Evernote; Don’t search for Lost Treasure without It! (timbelcher.wordpress.com)
How Guitar Columnist Pierre Journel Uses Evernote for Podcasting and House Hunting (evernote.com)
Now Attach Any File To Your Evernote Notebooks (techie-buzz.com)

Filed under: GTD, Law, Legal Productivity

Economic Development Planning Sources for Elkhorn City!

Timothy Belcher — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 20:02:56 +0000

The Elkhorn City Area Heritage Council is hosting a YourTown workshop on November 1 -2, 2011 in Downtown Elkhorn City, Kentucky. The workshop is made possible by grant form the National Endowment for the Arts and is a followup to our workshop in 2005.

I thought I would write-up a post for all the folks in Elkhorn City who are working on economic development plans and other city planning ideas. This would also be a great reference resource for the Workshop.

Here is a list of all the plans that reference Elkhorn City, Kentucky

How about a link to my post on the Ten Things Elkhorn City must do to Thrive.

The 2011 Elkhorn City Master Plan Document, Drafted by Citizens and Big Sandy ADD.
The 2008 Elkhorn City Strategic Master plan draft.
The Elkhorn City Area Heritage Council’s In River Whitewater Playpark Initiative development plan for the Russell Fork in Downtown EC.
The Elkhorn City Renaissance Map.
The Russell Fork River Connect Trail Plan appendix on the Economic Impact of Whitewater parks.
The Elkhorn City Public Art Plan drafted in 2005.
THe Elkhorn City Area Heritage Councils original development plan for EC.
The Elkhorn City Main Street Mission Vision and Goals.
A document showing traffic counts for Elkhorn City.
A document showing The Economic Impacts of River Recreation.
A Comprehensive Plan for Elkhorn City written by Roger Copley, in September 2011

Are are some links to Regional and Area Planning documents for reference.

The Big Sandy Regional Adventure Tourism Plan, January 2009 by Big Sandy ADD.

Governor Beshear’s four-year plan for Appalachia entitled, Appalachia Tomorrow 2009-2013. Showing the benefits of adventure tourism.

Filed under: Community, Economic Development, Elkhorn City, Tourism

Evernote; Don’t search for Lost Treasure without It!

Timothy Belcher — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 00:17:36 +0000

Every fall I love to get into the mountains and enjoy my favorite hobby of treasure hunting. One of the unique uses of Evernote I have found is to organize my treasure hunting research. Weather I am out in the mountains, in the library, or at home all my treasure hunting research is always with me in Evernote.

For the past 30 years I have had a hobby of looking for John Swift’s Lost Silver Mine. Searching for the silver mine began when my grandfather and I would take long walks in the woods when I was in my early teens. Since that time I have kept notebooks, copies of articles and stories and maps of the many geographic areas concerning the silver mine legend. Keeping track of all the research and stories concerning the silver mine has been a very tedious task. In the early 1990′s I began keeping all the notes in a word processing program and retyping a lot of the print material into the word processor so I could search my data by key word. I also had hundreds of photographs that I have taken of unique rock cravings and treasure signs, that were stored in photo albums. Then came Evernote!

With Evernote all this became a simple process. I began using Evernote in my law practice and day-to-day life, then one day it occurred to me to put all my “Swift Stuff” into evernote. It was actually an easy because I had been scanning a lot of the articles and other materials into PDF files ever since I bought my ScanSnap scanner about 4 years ago.

First I scanned every piece of paper and picture I had regarding the silver mine with the ScanSnap. I even scanned my hand written journals and notes. Evernote’s software will even search your handwriting. Evernote also allows you to create an image note, so I loaded all my photos of rock cravings and places associated with the legend. Then it is a simple matter of sending it to Evernote or just dragging and dropping it into the Evernote desktop.

I have Evernote on my Android Phone, my iPad, by laptop and my office computer and they all sync seamlessly. Perhaps one of the best uses of Evernote is taking a snapshot (picture) directly in Evernote with my phone and then being able to view every photograph I have when I am in the mountains searching for the Swift Treasure. I can get to my whole Swift Treasure reference library from anywhere.

Evernote is great to use while doing research on the internet. When I find that great article for an old newspaper or magazine online I can send it right into Evernote. Evernote has a web clipper for most browsers that allows you to clip web pages directly into Evernote.

You can also share your notes or whole notebooks with others, even if they do not have an Evernote account. A link to one of my Swift Notes can be viewed here straight from my Evernote account.

If you want more information on the Swift story you can find Mike Steely’s excellent book here. Also Ed Henson has written an excellent fiction novel entitled Swift which you can find here.

Review: Fujitsu ScanSnap S1100 Instant PDF Document Scanner (geardiary.com)
Evernote Tips Tricks and Resources (ismckenzie.com)
Evernote: How do you use it? Talk amongst yourselves. (parenthacks.com)

Filed under: Elkhorn City, GTD, Legal Productivity, Life, Russell Fork River, Treasure Hunting

A Great Day to Get Wet!

Timothy Belcher — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 01:55:13 +0000

Sunday, July 10th, 2011, was a beautiful day in Elkhorn City and a good day for our little tourism industry. Ratliff’s Hole was full of people using the Russell Fork River. I saw 42 different paddlers in the river and 50 plus swimmers. The most interesting sight was the two folks using an air mattress and running down the river from the put in down to the play hole. They were having a blast, as was everyone using the river that today.

Last week, I saw two boaters from Alaska eating at the Rusty Fork Cafe. This morning I saw 13 boaters eating at the Rusty Fork. Today the license plates in the parking lot where from Fayette County, Jefferson County, Letcher County, Boyd County, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and North Carolina.

What amazes me about this is I saw about 8 locals at Ratliff’s Hole and only two of them using the river. Everyone else was out of county or out-of-state. Just like a prophet is not known in his or her hometown, the cleanest and most beautiful river in the eastern United States isn’t either. It makes me sad that we have such a great asset and it seems that most of the local people have no appreciation for it. Well, I guess they are all in South Carolina keeping Myrtle Beach in business. I heard that at the end of the month of July, South Carolina has to bring in the heavy equipment just to get the coal dust off the beach!

Another area of adventure tourism Elkhorn City is seeing some benefits from is the Transamerica 76 cross-country bike Trail. Today, I also saw 5 bicyclists coming through town on the Transamerica Trail. Earlier in the week a group of 10 came through and a couple of them had some mechanical breakdowns. This has happened a lot this year. It really points out the need for a small bicycle shop in town. We used to have one back in the early 1990′s and it did pretty well. In fact, I bought my bicycle from “Bike Mike” at the Mountain Bike Shop. It was next to the post office on one side of the old Western Auto building.

Today reinforced to me they need for the Elkhorn City to develop the Russell Fork River in its downtown. The Elkhorn City Area Heritage Council has a detailed plan regarding a whitewater in river play park for the downtown area. I can imagine 100 times the activity I saw today at Ratliff’s Hole right in the middle of downtown Elkhorn City when it is completed. You can find the plan here and it is well worth the read. Take a look and let me know what you think.

Filed under: Community, Economic Development, Elkhorn City, Russell Fork River, Tourism

Here’s our signs!

Timothy Belcher — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 15:10:39 +0000

Thanks to the Kentucky Department of Transportation and Sara George’s great follow-up on my earlier blog post, we have some new road signs in Elkhorn City and Elkhorn Creek. In fact, I am told that the Trans-America Bicycle route is now signed all the way to the Perry County Line. I hope the rest of the state follows up and signs the route all the way across Kentucky.

Since my last post regarding the Bike trail we have had about 450 bicyclists come through Elkhorn City since early March. I only count the ones I see so the number is probably higher as to the total use of the 1976 Trans-America Bicycle Trail.

I see most of them at the local restaurant (402 to be exact) and I have seen a lot of them at the local grocery store, that means they are spending money in the local economy. If we are having a weekend event in Elkhorn City some of the bicyclists hang around the whole weekend. Based on my rough estimates I would say that bicyclists have about a $25,000.00 dollar a year impact on Elkhorn City’s economy.

Filed under: Community, Elkhorn City, Tourism

Here’s Your Sign … or Where are all the signs!

Timothy Belcher — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 03:58:44 +0000

Today I met a nice gentlemen named Andre’ from France. He and his wife were biking across the United States along the Transamerica Trail. They had stayed at the Breaks Interstate Park and made it into Elkhorn City about 11:00 a.m. Every year I talk to numerous bicyclists who come through Elkhorn City along the trail.

My conversation with Andre’ was insightful for two reasons. One, I enjoy talking to and meeting new people, especially form other countries, and two, Andre’ could not figure out why the TransAmerica Trail had good signage all along the route in Virginia, but as soon as he got into Kentucky there where no signs at all showing the route.

When the trail was first developed, in 1976, there was good signage all along the trial in Eastern Kentucky. I can remember seeing the signs and I also remember bicyclists staying in the basement of the Elkhorn City Church of Christ.

This brought home to me the fact that we need to do more work to develop our adventure tourism infastructure in Kentucky. Replacing the signs along the Kentucky section of the Transamerica Trail makes good sense. It is the type of project that adds value to our tourism infastruture and would not be expensive to complete. Governor Beasher has made a big push for adventure tourism, it seems to me that replaces the signs along the Transamerica Trail is a no brainer.

If you feel the same way contact the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet and let them know we need to put up signs for our tourist who use the Transamerica Trail.

Kentucky Transportation Cabinet

Division of Multimodal Programs

125 Holmes Street, 3rd Floor

Frankfort, Kentucky 40622

502-564-7433

The Transportation Cabinet has put out a nice pdf document on Bicycling in Kentucky and all the Bike Trials in the state you can find it HERE

First Bicyclist of the Year in EC (timbelcher.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Elkhorn City, Russell Fork River, Tourism

Life in a Small Town Law Office

The First Thing to Consider BEFORE Your Auto Accident!

Related articles

2011 in review

New Swift Silver Mine Book Published

Coal Truck Accidents -Get the evidence quickly!

Use Evernote for your Closing Argument “swipe file”

Related articles

Economic Development Planning Sources for Elkhorn City!

Evernote; Don’t search for Lost Treasure without It!

Related articles

A Great Day to Get Wet!

Here’s our signs!

Here’s Your Sign … or Where are all the signs!

Related articles