Rep Brad Hill says…
Paul Ritchie posted in News on April 4th, 2006
(My comments to Mr Hill’s response are italicized in parentheses.)
Dear Mr. Ritchie,
Thank you for your recent e-mail regarding the different proposals being
floated by the Legislature dealing with the junior operators license. I
believe better education, more experience and more parental involvement
will help our teen drivers become better.
(Without doubt, Mr Hill, without doubt.)
What I am proposing is to increase the hours that are mandated for behind
the wheel experience in driver’s ed from 6 hours to 12 hours. I am also proposing
that the parental driving within the learners permit phase of driving be
increased from 12 hours to 30 hours and that parents fill out a log that
will show that the kids have driven and they must sign the log before
the child can take the road test.
(It’ll work for the honest ones, but I was forging my mother’s signature for
school stuff from the time I was 14. (Homework diary and getting out of sport.)
The news crews will pick that up as quickly as I have. I would hope they see
the point of the exercise is the lives of our teenagers and focus on that positive aspect
rather than take the negative view that it’s just one more impost on those poor old
parents. The experiences of truancy monitors might come in useful here.
Again, I would hope such a system would not be abused, that parents would take
the issue of the safety of their kids seriously enough not to short circuit this system,
but I’m afraid I don’t have that much faith in some of them.
You can lead the horse to water, but you can’t make it drink, and all that. But
having said that, it’s the responsibility of elected representatives to create the
framework, not to see to it that every individual dots their i’s and crosses
their t’s. My apologies for the two metaphors.)
I also propose that we increase the penalties for those who do not obey the child
and time restriction laws. We also need to give the police the tool of a primary
offense in enforcing the current law. The way it is now is that police cannot pull
over these jol offenders without first pulling them over for another
offense.
(Commonsense! It seems absurd to see one offense occuring and not be
able to act on it until another offense has been committed. I hope they see that.)
My proposal also looks at the curriculum of driver ed courses
and how we can make change to better educate our young drivers.
(The first thing my driving instructor told me was he will teach me to get my
license and that getting my license and actual driving are two different things.
It would be a good move to do something about that mindset.)
I do have some concerns with the proposal that is being forwarded by the
Committee on increasing the age to 17 1/2. The Studies I have seen show
that the more experienced the driver the better he or she is. I feel by
increasing the age may give an incentive for kids not to take drivers ed
and therefore would have no experience or education before getting ones
license.
(Good point, though I’m inclined to disagree. I’m afraid I don’t
put a great deal of stock in driver ed classes, but I’m happy to defer to your
experience on that point. It seems 17 being the mid point may turn out to
be the compromise which is reached.)
Please know that I am working with the Leadership of the House and
Senate on this issue and I believe working together that a bill that we
can be proud of will make its way to the Governor’s desk for his
signature. Thank you for your comments on this issue and if I can be of
further assistance to you do not hesitate to contact me.
Sincerely,
Rep. Hill
I would like to point out that so far, Mr Hill is the only representative who has
contacted me and I’m taking this opportunity to express my thanks. I will also
go on record as saying I knew Mr Hill’s position before I contacted him by email
to offer support for his position and coverage in this blog. Yep, I’m biased as a lawn
bowl on this issue and unashamedly so. Mr Hill did not make any comment about
coverage or this blog, as you see. The reply he sent has been posted here in its entirety
and unedited.
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