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New Colorado Law Bolsters Record Keeping, Education
COLORADO, May 18, 2009 — The Centennial State has long required records to be
kept for some notarial acts, but a new state law expands that mandate to include
all notarizations, joining a growing national trend toward stronger
recordkeeping and accountability.
Senate Bill 111, which goes into effect on July 1, is the third piece of
legislation enacted this year that creates or expands Notary recordkeeping
requirements in part to combat the epidemic of mortgage fraud, a scourge that
has hit Colorado hard. Colorado currently has the 10th highest incidence of
mortgage fraud in the country, according to the latest report from the Mortgage
Asset Research Institute, and the state has ranked in the top 10 four out of the
last five years. Illinois and Montana are the other states to recently pass
recordkeeping laws.
Previous Colorado law required Notaries to keep a record only for
acknowledgments related to real estate titles. Now, all notarial acts —
including jurats and copy certifications — require some kind of record. For
self-employed Notaries, such as Signing Agents, that means maintaining a
journal. For Notaries who work for businesses, the employer may keep documents
or electronic records related to notarizations that contain all the information
that would be included in a journal entry. However, there is nothing in the law
that prohibits Notary-employees from maintaining a journal that reflects their
work-related notarizations, and it is always considered a best practice to keep
a record of all notarizations.
In addition, SB 111 expressly prohibits an employer from preventing a
Notary-employee from maintaining a journal in the regular course of employment.
This requirement was one of the elements retained from the old Notary law. A
journal entry protects the public and the Notary in the event that a document is
lost, falsified or contested. It further deters fraud by discouraging
individuals who will not want to sign a journal or leave other potentially
incriminating information in it.
The law also lays the groundwork for mandatory Notary education by authorizing
the Secretary of State to create a training program. Observers expect a
mandatory education rule ultimately will be issued.
New Colorado Law Allows Notarized Wills
Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter signed a bill into law May 21,2009 that allows the
use of notarized wills as an alternative to wills that are attested by two
witnesses.
House Bill 1287 amends the Colorado Revised Statutes Section 15-11-502 to
state that a will shall be in writing; signed by the testator or in the testator’s
name by someone in the testator’s conscious presence and by the testator’s
direction; and either signed by at least two witnesses or acknowledged by the
testator before a notary public or other individual authorized by law to take
acknowledgments.
The bill states that testimony is not needed to prove that a will is
self-proved, unless there is evidence of fraud or forgery affecting the
acknowledgment or affidavit of the will. The bill also creates a rebuttable
presumption that a notarized will meets the requirements for execution of a will
and allows the attestation or testimony of an attesting witness to establish
proper execution of a witnessed will.
The new law takes effect July 1, 2010.
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