BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
AB 1888 (Gatto) - Traffic violator school: holders of commercial
driver's licenses.
Amended: June 20, 2012 Policy Vote: T&H 8-0
Urgency: No Mandate: No
Hearing Date: August 12, 2012
Consultant: Mark McKenzie
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: AB 1888 would allow a person who holds a
commercial driver's license (CDL) to attend traffic violator
school (TVS) to adjudicate a traffic offense committed while
operating a non-commercial vehicle.
Fiscal Impact: Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) programming
costs of approximately $175,000 (Motor Vehicle Account) related
to provisions that prohibit a conviction from resulting in a
violation point for CDL holders that attend a TVS.
Background: Existing law authorizes a court to order a person
who holds a noncommercial class C (passenger cars and light-duty
truck) or Class M (motorcycle) driver's license to attend a TVS,
if that person is convicted of a traffic violation and pays a
specified fee. Successful completion of a TVS allows a traffic
violator to avoid the assignment of a violation point on his or
her driving record and future car insurance premium increases
because the conviction is kept confidential, or "masked." A
violator can only attend a TVS one time in any 18-month period
and a court cannot order a violator to attend a TVS if the
person is convicted of specified serious offenses. A person
holding a class A, class B, or commercial class C driver's
license (generally commercial trucks and large vehicles) is
explicitly prohibited from attending a TVS to adjudicate any
traffic offense, or having a conviction kept confidential.
Proposed Law: AB 1888 would authorize a person who holds a class
A, B, or commercial class C driver's license to attend a TVS if
that person is convicted of a traffic offense while operating a
vehicle requiring only a class C or M license. A record of the
conviction would not be kept confidential from the public
AB 1888 (Gatto)
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record, but a violation point would not be added to the person's
record for purposes of making a negligent operator
determination.
The bill would also prohibit a court from permitting any person
convicted of specified two point violations to attend a traffic
violator school, have the conviction kept confidential, or avoid
assignment of violation points for that conviction.
Staff Comments: Under existing law, the Department of Motor
Vehicles does not assign a violation point for convictions of
traffic offenses that are adjudicated by attendance at a TVS,
and the conviction is masked from the violator's driving record.
This bill would allow a new class of driver's license holders
to attend a TVS to adjudicate a traffic offense, but a record of
the conviction would not be masked, and the violation would not
result in the assignment of a violation point for purposes of
making a negligent operator violation. This special treatment
would require DMV to make programming changes to prevent the
assignment of a violation point to this subgroup of CDL holders
convicted of a traffic offense committed while operating a
noncommercial vehicle. DMV would incur programming costs of
approximately $175,000 to make necessary changes to their
information systems.
DMV currently charges licensing fees to TVS owners, operators,
instructors, and classroom locations in an amount necessary to
defray costs to administer the TVS program. In addition, DMV
has the authority to charge a fee on traffic violators that is
collected by the courts in an amount sufficient to defray the
costs of routine monitoring of TVS instruction. None of the
fees related to the administration of the TVS program may be
used to cover DMV's programming costs incurred as a result of
this bill.