The Lane Ranger: Later age for teens not only way to toughen driving laws
2001 GEORGIA LEGISLATURE
Joey Ledford - Staff
Wednesday, February 14, 2001

If Gov. Roy Barnes' bid to raise the driving age in 18 core metro Atlanta counties fails, it will not gut the proposed toughening of Georgia's teen driving laws.

Rep. Bobby Parham, chairman of the House Motor Vehicle Committee, which heard its first testimony on teen driving laws Tuesday, reiterated that he does not think a higher driving age will pass the House. But Parham does believe some kind of tough teen driving bill will pass before lawmakers go home --- and it might not occur until right before the final gavel.

Don't discount the possibility that Barnes, who has grabbed much of the attention focused on teen driving with the driving age proposal, will use it as a bargaining chip to win passage of provisions like a tougher curfew, more restrictions on teen passengers and automatic suspensions for any young driver who is cited for a two-point moving violation.

Of all the provisions on the table, raising the driving age has the least proven value as a life saver. New Jersey, which has had a 17-year-old driving age for years, reports drivers that age have the highest fatality rates of any age, rates comparable to Georgia's 16-year-olds.

Gary Butler, Georgia program manager for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, agreed that a higher driving age is the lowest priority of all the items being discussed. "I think the curfew, limiting passengers and (license suspensions for) moving violations --- those are the ones that are going to pay some benefits," he said.

Georgia's teen death rates just don't support the conclusion that it's more dangerous for teenagers to drive in metro Atlanta vs. rural Georgia, despite the contentions Tuesday of Rep. Charlie Smith (D-St. Marys), Barnes' House floor leader, who claimed a "huge majority of accidents and deaths occur within 18 or 20 miles from where we are sitting right now."

Tougher curfews are a proven lifesaver in other states, including North Carolina, where 16-year-olds can't drive past 9 p.m. A recent study in North Carolina found that the strict nighttime driving prohibition has reduced teen crash rates by almost half.

A similar no-drive time --- starting at 10 p.m. for 16-year-olds and at midnight for 17-year-olds --- being proposed by Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor and Sen. Phil Gingrey (R-Marietta) still has strong opposition from rural legislators in the House, said Parham.

"It's not unusual in rural Georgia . . . to drive 75 miles to another high school for a ballgame," he said. The postgame drive home would put young drivers in danger of a citation.

John Morris of Atlanta, longtime safe teen driving advocate who was one of more than a dozen witnesses to testify Tuesday, said he personally rates the moving violations provision as the top priority.

The Gingrey-Taylor bill does away with what Morris calls "the seven-ticket loophole" that allows a teenager to keep his license despite numerous tickets, as long as none of them is for major four-point violations such as speeding more than 24 mph over the limit.

"Studies show that the people who get tickets are the ones who cause crashes," Morris testified.

Several parents who have lost teenage sons or daughters in crashes testified, including Cobb County Superior Court Judge Adell Grubbs, whose 16-year-old daughter Alexis was killed in 1998.

"So you have to pick up your child at the ballgame," she told the committee in arguing for a tougher curfew. "So what? That's part of your responsibility as a parent."

But Justin Randall of Marietta, another parent who has lost a child, argued that the laws shouldn't single out teens. He argued for tougher laws for all drivers and more aggressive law enforcement.

"Holding our children to a standard we are unable to uphold ourselves is cowardly," he said. "It says, 'Do as I say, not as I do.' "