Who is an incapacitated person?

According to the Texas Probate Code, an incapacitated person includes:

a minor (e.g., a person under the age of 18);

an adult individual who, because of a physical or mental condition, is substantially unable to provide food, clothing, or shelter for himself or herself, to care for the individual's own physical health, or to manage the individual's own financial affairs; or

a person who must have a guardian appointed to receive funds due the person from any governmental source.
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What is Guardianship?

Texas guardianship law has come a long way in recent years. The code sections formerly spoke of persons under guardianship as “lunatics and idiots,” and stripped the ward of many fundamental rights, such as the right to vote. 

Fortunately, Texans no longer refer to incapacitated persons in such terms, and the role of the guardian is designed to be limited to only those functions to protect the ward’s well-being. In fact, the statute encourages the court to design guardianship to encourage the development or maintenance of maximum self-reliance and independence in the incapacitated person. 

There are two kinds of guardianship – guardianship over the person (e.g., medical and educational decisions) and guardianship over the estate (ward’s finances). Generally speaking, guardianship matters are heard in courts with probate jurisdiction, such as statutorily created probate courts. In Houston/Harris County we have four probate courts to hear guardianship matters. 

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