Rice Proposes Trio Of Laws To Combat Impaired, Distracted Driving

On Thursday, Congresswoman Kathleen Rice introduced a package of three bills that would combat impaired and distracted driving.

The End Drunk Driving Act will require that within 10 years, all new cars sold in the U.S. come equipped with advanced DWI-prevention technology; the Prevent Impaired Driving Child Endangerment Act will set national standards for criminal penalties against individuals who drive while intoxicated or impaired with a child in the car; and the Distracted Driving Education Act of 2019 will create a new education grant program for non-profit organizations working to combat distracted driving.

“My hope is that with these three bills, we can take a major step toward ending impaired and distracted driving in this country once and for all,” said Rice, a Democrat from Garden City. “Taken together, nearly 15,000 were killed in 2018 because of an impaired or distracted driver – these are deadly and tragic epidemics that have claimed too many lives and destroyed too many families. It’s past time that we take action at the federal level to end this crisis.”

The End Drunk Driving Act will require that within 10 years, all new cars sold in the U.S. come with DWI-prevention technology that detects a driver’s blood alcohol content (BAC) and prevents the car from moving if the driver’s BAC is at or above the legal limit. The technology is currently being developed through the Driver Alcohol Detection System for Safety (DADSS) program, Rice said, a research partnership between the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Automotive Coalition for Traffic Safety (ACTS), which represents 17 leading automobile manufacturers.

In 2015, NHTSA and ACTS unveiled prototypes of touch-based and breath-based technologies. The touch-based technology responds to the touch of a driver’s fingertip and uses infrared light to measure the driver’s BAC. Unlike a breathalyzer, the DADSS breath-based technology does not require a driver to breathe into a tube – a driver simply enters the vehicle and breathes normally, and sensors detect the driver’s BAC using infrared light. Rice’s legislation will require the technology to be installed in all new cars sold in the U.S. within 10 years of the bill’s enactment.

A study conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan found that requiring DWI-prevention technology in all new cars sold in the U.S. could prevent an estimated 85 percent of all drunk driving-related fatalities over 15 years, said Rice, saving more than 59,000 lives. It could also prevent an estimated 1.25 million nonfatal drunk driving-related injuries over the same 15-year period.

The Prevent Impaired Driving Child Endangerment Act will set national standards for criminal penalties against individuals who drive while intoxicated or impaired with a child in the. The legislation will compel every state in the country to adopt laws similar to New York State’s Leandra’s Law, which made it a felony offense for an individual to drive drunk or impaired with a child in the car. While most states have taken some action to crack down on those who commit this crime, Leandra’s Law in New York is the toughest and most comprehensive child endangerment law in the country. Rice proposed a similar law in 2016.

Rice's proposal requires states to enact the following laws:

• A law that provides that the individual can be charged with a felony and face to up to four years in prison;
• A law that requires the individual, if convicted, to install and maintain an ignition interlock system on any car they own or operate;
• A law that suspends the individual’s driver’s license during the course of prosecution, unless the individual installs and maintains an ignition interlock system;
• A law that requires the individual, if convicted, to undergo an alcohol abuse, substance abuse or mental health assessment and, if the assessment indicates the need for treatment, authorizes the appropriate court or monitoring agency to require the individual to undergo treatment as part of their sentence or as a condition for reissuance of their license;
• A law that requires authorities to file a report with the appropriate state register of child abuse if the individual is the parent, guardian or custodian of the child passenger, or is in any way legally responsible for the child.

The third bill, the Distracted Driving Education Act of 2019, will authorize the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to award $5 million in competitive grant funding to non-profit organizations working to educate the public and prevent distracted driving in communities across the country.