Will the House Finally OK a Seat Belt Bill?

In an impassioned plea before the Senate Transportation Committee recently, state Sen. Harry Blevins, R-Chesapeake, said he has attended too many funerals, visited too many hospital rooms and comforted too many grieving parents of young men and women killed because they weren’t wearing seat belts.

Blevins believes those numbers must go down. He says they will drop if the state would make not wearing a seat belt a primary offense. That means police could pull over a driver solely for not wearing the safety device — a device that does save lives and prevents more serious injuries.

Currently, all front-seat occupants of a vehicle must wear seat belts. But violations of the law are considered secondary offenses, meaning a police officer cannot pull over a driver solely for a seat belt violation.

As the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported, Blevins recalled the deaths of two young women, ages 17 and 19, involved in a crash on Interstate 664 in which they were not wearing seat belts. “I thought, what would I do if that was my daughter or granddaughter?” Blevins told the committee. He suggested the bill is necessary because the law would command more respect — not only of teenage drivers, but also of their parents.

If the law is made tougher, Virginia drivers will pay more attention to it. Most of them do respect traffic laws and abide by them. But with the seat belt use being only a secondary offense, the hands of the police are basically tied unless they can connect not wearing a seat belt with another offense, such as speeding or running a red light.

Blevins also strongly made the point that use of seat belts saves lives. “I think we have an obligation to do something about the loss of life,” he told his colleagues on the committee.

They listened to his arguments, approving the bill and sending it to the full Senate, where it was approved on a 24-16 vote. Blevins did not get any help from Sen. Steve Newman, R-Lynchburg, who voted against the measure in committee and on the Senate floor.

Virginia State Police, AAA of Virginia and the auto insurance industry have supported similar legislation in the past, agreeing with Blevins that mandatory use of seat belts saves lives and money. Blevins cited statistics that 60 percent of auto fatalities in 2007 and 2008 involved victims who did not wear seat belts.

The tougher seat belt rule has not fared well in the House of Delegates, where Republicans who are in control have suggested such legislation represents government intrusion into the private lives of the people.

But Blevins is not daunted by that history. He said he is committed to trying to get the bill approved. “I’m going to try to share with them the same things I shared here,” he said.

For the sake of those who don’t understand that seat belts do save lives and prevent more serious injuries, one must hope that the delegates will finally put the force of state law ahead of their personal ideology that protects no one from crashes on Virginia’s highways.