Norfolk County Register of Deeds Supports Modernization of Registries

Continuing his efforts to streamline the ever increasing amount of paperwork that must be stored by registries and reduce the financial burden on taxpayers, Norfolk County Register of Deeds William P. O’Donnell recently testified before the Joint Committee of the Judiciary in support of House Bill 1493, an act to modernize the Registries of Deeds.

The storage of original registered land documents has become problematic, O’Donnell testified, and said the legal requirement has resulted in significant space issues facing many registries of deeds

The Norfolk County of Deeds stores over 1.3 million registered land documents. Such documents include deeds, homesteads, mortgages, mortgage discharges and Declaration of Trusts.

House Bill 1493 has the unanimous endorsement of the Massachusetts Registers and Assistant Registers of Deeds Association which represents all 21 of the Registry of Deeds recording districts. In addition, the legislation has been co-sponsored by 51 state legislators across the Commonwealth.