BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SAFETY
Senator Loni Hancock, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: SB 61 Hearing Date: March 24, 2015
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|Author: |Hill |
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|Version: |March 11, 2015 |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|MK |
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Subject: Driving Under the Influence: Ignition Interlock Device
HISTORY
Source: Author
Prior Legislation:SB 55 (Hill) - held in Assembly Appropriations
(2013)
AB 520 (Ammiano) - Chapter 657, Stats. 2011
SB 598 (Huff) - Chapter 193, Stats. 2009
AB 91 (Feuer) - Chapter 217, Stats. 2009
SB 1190 (Oropeza) - Chapter 392, Stats. 2008
SB 1361 (Correa) - Vetoed (2008)
SB 1388 (Torlakson) - Chapter 404, Stats. 2008
AB 2784 (Feuer) - until August 28, 2008 version
SB 177 (Migden) - did not move (2007)
AB 4 (Bogh) - held in Assembly Appropriations
(2005)
AB 979 (Runner) - Chapter 646, Stats. of 2005
AB 638 (Longville) - prior to 7/2/2003 amends
died on Concurrence (2003)
AB 1026 (Levine) - failed Senate
Public Safety (2003)
AB 762 (Torlakson) - Chapter 756,
Stats. of 1998
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Support: MADD; Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety; Alameda
County District Attorney; Alameda County Sheriff's
Office; American Nurses Association\California;
California State Sheriffs' Association; California
Council on Alcohol Problems; California State Council;
County of San Diego; Emergency Nurses Association;
National Safety Council; National Transportation
Safety Board; Peace Officers Research Association of
California
Opposition:California Attorneys for Criminal Justice; California
Public Defenders Association
PURPOSE
The purpose of this bill is to require a DUI offender to install
an ignition interlock device (IID) on his or her vehicle for a
specified period of time in order to get a restricted license or
to reinstate his or her license and to remove the required
suspension time before a person can get a restricted license.
Existing law provides it is unlawful for any person who is under
the influence of any alcoholic beverage or drug, or under the
combined influence of any alcoholic beverage and drug, to drive
a vehicle. (Vehicle Code § 23152(a).)
Existing law provides that it is unlawful for any person, while
having 0.08 percent or more, by weight, of alcohol in his or her
blood to drive a vehicle. (Vehicle Code § 23152(b).)
Existing law provides that a person who is convicted of a first
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DUI is subject to the following penalties when given probation:
possible 48 hours to 6 months in jail;
$390 to $1,000 fine plus 250% penalty assessments;
completion of a 3-month treatment program or a 9-month
program if the BAC was .20% or more;
6 month license suspension or 10 month suspension if
9-month program is ordered; and
Restricted license may be sought upon proof of
enrollment or completion of program, proof of financial
responsibility and payment of fees. However, the court may
disallow the restricted license. (Vehicle Code §§ 13352
(a)(1); 13352.1; 13352.4; 23538(a)(3).)
Existing law provides that a person who is convicted of a first
DUI with injury is subject to the following penalties:
16 months, 2 or 3 years in state prison or 90 days to 1
year in county jail;
$390 to $1,000 fine plus 250% penalty assessments; and
1 year driver's license suspension.
Or, when probation is given:
5 days to one year in jail;
$390 to $1,000 fine plus 250% penalty assessments;
1 year license suspension;
3 month treatment program or a 9-month program if the
BAC was .20% or more; and
the additional penalties that apply to a first DUI
without injury. (Vehicle Code § 23554.)
Existing law provides that the Department of Motor Vehicles
shall advise the person convicted of a second DUI that after
completion of 12 months of the suspension period, the person may
apply for a restricted license subject to the following
conditions are met:
Proof of enrollment in an 18 month or 30 month
driving-under- the influence program.
The person agrees to continued satisfactory
participation in the program.
The person submits proof of installation of an ignition
interlock device.
The person provides proof of insurance.
The person pays all fees. (Vehicle Code § 13352
(a)(3).)
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Existing law provides that the Department of Motor Vehicles
shall advise the person convicted of a third DUI that after
completion of 12 months of the suspension period, the person may
apply for a restricted license subject to the following
conditions are met:
Proof of enrollment in an 18 month or 30 month
driving-under-the influence program.
The person agrees to continued satisfactory
participation in the program.
The person submits proof of installation of an ignition
interlock device.
The person provides proof of insurance.
The person pays all fees. (Vehicle Code § 13352
(a)(5).)
Existing law provides that if a first-offender DUI is found to
have a blood concentration of .20% BAC or above or who refused
to take a chemical test, the court shall refer the offender to
participate in a 9-month licensed program. (Vehicle Code §
23538 (b)(2).)
Existing law provides that a first-time DUI offender sentenced
to a 9-month program because of a high BAC or a refusal shall
have their license suspended for 10 months. The law further
provides that their license may not be reinstated until the
person gives proof of insurance and proof of completion of the
required program. (Vehicle Code § 13352.1.)
Existing law provides that a person convicted of a first-time
DUI may apply for a restricted license for driving to and from
work and to and from a driver-under-influence program if
specified requirements are met, paying all applicable fees,
submitting proof of insurance and proof of participation in a
program. (Vehicle Code § 13352.4.)
Existing law provides that a second or subsequent DUI offender
can get his or her license reinstated earlier if he or she
agrees to install an Ignition Interlock Device (IID) along with
his or her enrollment in the required program, proof of
insurance and payment of specified fees. (Vehicle Code §§
13352(a)(3)(B); (a)(4) (B); (a)(5)(C); (a)(6)(B); (a)(7)(B)&(C))
Existing law creates an IID pilot project in Alameda, Los
Angeles, Sacramento and Tulare Counties requiring a person
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convicted of a DUI to install an IID for 5 months upon a first
offense, 12 months for a second offense, 24 months for a 3rd
offense and for 36 months for a 4th or subsequent offense.
(Vehicle Code § 23700)
Existing law requires DMV to report to the Legislature regarding
the effectiveness of the IID pilot project to reduce the number
of first-time violations and repeat DUI offenses. (Vehicle Code
§ 23701)
This bill extends the existing pilot project until July 1, 2016.
This bill provides that beginning July 1, 2016 all DUI offenders
will be required to install an IID for a specified period of
time in order to have their license reinstated.
This bill removes the time a person must have a suspended
license before he or she is able to apply for a restricted
license.
This bill would allow a court to order a person convicted of a
"wet reckless" to install an ignition interlock device on his or
her car.
RECEIVERSHIP/OVERCROWDING CRISIS AGGRAVATION
For the past eight years, this Committee has scrutinized
legislation referred to its jurisdiction for any potential
impact on prison overcrowding. Mindful of the United States
Supreme Court ruling and federal court orders relating to the
state's ability to provide a constitutional level of health care
to its inmate population and the related issue of prison
overcrowding, this Committee has applied its "ROCA" policy as a
content-neutral, provisional measure necessary to ensure that
the Legislature does not erode progress in reducing prison
overcrowding.
On February 10, 2014, the federal court ordered California to
reduce its in-state adult institution population to 137.5% of
design capacity by February 28, 2016, as follows:
143% of design bed capacity by June 30, 2014;
141.5% of design bed capacity by February 28, 2015; and,
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137.5% of design bed capacity by February 28, 2016.
In its most recent status report to the court (February 2015),
the administration reported that as "of February 11, 2015,
112,993 inmates were housed in the State's 34 adult
institutions, which
amounts to 136.6% of design bed capacity, and 8,828 inmates were
housed in out-of-state
facilities. This current population is now below the
court-ordered reduction to 137.5% of design
bed capacity."(Defendants' February 2015 Status Report In
Response To February 10, 2014 Order, 2:90-cv-00520 KJM DAD PC,
3-Judge Court, Coleman v. Brown, Plata v. Brown (fn. omitted).
While significant gains have been made in reducing the prison
population, the state now must stabilize these advances and
demonstrate to the federal court that California has in place
the "durable solution" to prison overcrowding "consistently
demanded" by the court. (Opinion Re: Order Granting in Part and
Denying in Part Defendants' Request For Extension of December
31, 2013 Deadline, NO. 2:90-cv-0520 LKK DAD (PC), 3-Judge Court,
Coleman v. Brown, Plata v. Brown (2-10-14). The Committee's
consideration of bills that may impact the prison population
therefore will be informed by the following questions:
Whether a proposal erodes a measure which has contributed
to reducing the prison population;
Whether a proposal addresses a major area of public safety
or criminal activity for which there is no other
reasonable, appropriate remedy;
Whether a proposal addresses a crime which is directly
dangerous to the physical safety of others for which there
is no other reasonably appropriate sanction;
Whether a proposal corrects a constitutional problem or
legislative drafting error; and
Whether a proposal proposes penalties which are
proportionate, and cannot be achieved through any other
reasonably appropriate remedy.
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COMMENTS
1. Need for the Bill
According to the author:
California needs to improve the way we handle DUI
offenders since DUI crashes kill 1,000 people each
year in this state and injure more than 20,000.
According to the DMVs 2012 report, Identifying
Barriers to Driving Privilege Reinstatement Among
California DUI Offenders, "Only about 54% of the
eligible 1st offenders and 36% of the eligible 2nd
offenders had fully reinstated their driving
privileges 3.8 to 4.8 years after their arrest."
According to the DMV's January 2015 report on the AB
91 four-county IID pilot program, General Deterrent
Evaluation of the Ignition Interlock Pilot Program in
California, only 42% participated in the IID program.
Whether we're talking about the IID program or the
general DUI population, a large portion of DUI
offenders are likely driving illegally since they
aren't participating in the required programs.
Senate Bill 61 seeks to increase participation in DUI
programs statewide by allowing DUI offenders to
reinstate driving privileges immediately after arrest
if they install an IID. This immediate driving
incentive allows offenders to continue to work and
handle family responsibilities without waiting months
for DMV and court hearings.
2. The Pilot Project
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In 2009, AB 91 (Feuer) created an IID pilot project in four
counties which mandates the use of an IID for all DUI offenders.
DMV will report on the pilot project in January of 2015
regarding the effectiveness of the pilot project in reducing the
number of first-time violations and repeat offenses in the
specified counties.
The rationale for a pilot project was to see what impact a
mandatory IID program has on recidivism in California. While
the impact of IID has been studied elsewhere, with mixed
results, the comparisons are not perfect because while some of
the other states began mandating IID at the same time they
strengthened other sanctions, California has had a complex group
of sanctions including high fines, jail time, licensing
sanctions, mandatory drinker-driver treatment programs and
optional IID in place since the mid-1980's with sanctions being
evaluated, changed and strengthened on an ongoing basis since.
The thought was that with a pilot project, DMV can evaluate how
best a mandatory IID system should work in California. By
evaluating four counties, the counties without the mandatory
programs act like a control group for the researchers at DMV.
Evaluating how the DUI sanctions work is something DMV
researchers have been doing with great success since 1990. DMV's
reports have helped inform the Legislature on where changes
needed to be made and have helped reduce recidivism in
California.
3. Results From the Pilot Project
In January of this year, DMV released their report on the pilot
project entitled "General Deterrent Evaluation of the Ignition
Interlock Pilot Program in California." The report found that
even though "[d]uring the pilot period, IID installation rates
increased dramatically in the pilot counties to include 42.4% of
all DUI offenders combined, compared to 2.1% during the
pre-pilot period" the study found that " there were no
differences in the license-based rates of DUI convictions in the
pilot counties among first, second, and third-or-more DUI
offenders during the pilot program as compared to the pre-pilot
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program." (California DMV, "General Deterrent Evaluation of the
Ignition Interlock Pilot Program in California" January 2015
Executive Summary p. vii) Thus the pilot projects showed no
"general deterrent" effect of requiring the installation of an
IID by all offenders. Requiring the installation did not result
in fewer DUI's in the pilot counties.
By the January 2015 due date, DMV was not able to gather the
appropriate data to do an additional report on specific
deterrent but intends to have such a report completed by the
fall of 2015. While general deterrent shows whether the threat
of an IID will keep a person from committing a DUI the first
time, a report on a specific deterrent will show whether the
installation of an IID by a DUI offender will keep that person
from becoming a repeat offender. Both are relevant goals in
deciding what sanctions shall be imposed on a DUI offender.
Because the report of the pilot projects showed no general
deterrent and it is not yet known what the results on specific
deterrent will show, DMV recommends "that subsequent legislative
action take into consideration the findings of the specific
deterrence evaluation of this pilot program. This evaluation is
anticipated to be completed in the fall of 2015." (CA DMV id at
p.5)
4. Rates of Installation in the Pilot Counties
As the author notes in his background, the installation rates
for IID in this mandatory program increases significantly in the
pilot counties from a pre pilot average of 2.1% to an average of
42.4% installation rates. Non-pilot counties also saw a small
increase in installation during this time frame, from 2.1% to
4.3% because of a incentivized voluntary installation program
that began at the same time as the pilot. While the increase is
significant, once could ask that in a mandatory program why the
installation is not higher. A person with a DUI cannot get his
or her license back until he or she has shown that he or she has
installed an IID. First offenders make up most of the DUI
offenders and most first time DUI offenders can get their
license back within 6 months and many are eligible for a
restricted license sooner. The installation rate may indicate a
significant number of offenders who have not gone back to get a
valid license. They may not be driving or they may be driving
without a valid license and insurance.
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5. Mandatory Installation of IID
This bill would require any person convicted of a DUI to install
an ignition interlock device on all the cars he or she owns for
a specified period of time. A person convicted of a first
offense has a six month suspension and the IID must be installed
for six months. A person with a second offense has a two-year
suspension and the IID must be installed for 12 months. A
person with a third offense has a three year suspension and the
IID must be installed for 24 months. A person with a fourth or
subsequent offense has a four year suspension and the ID must be
installed for 36 months.
For repeat offenders, the mandatory IID time frame is shorter
than the time for the suspended license. As discussed more
below, this bill allows the IID to be installed immediately
after conviction, maybe as soon as an administrative suspension.
It is unclear how this works. A person with a 2nd DUI
immediately installs the IID and does the mandatory time of 12
months but would then still have an additional 12 months to
serve out their suspension. If he or she has complied with the
12 months can he or she remove the IID and still drive on a
restricted license?
6. Removal of Hard Suspension
Under existing law, a person convicted of a DUI must wait a
period of time before they can apply to DMV for a restricted
license. Since 2005, all licensing actions have gone through
DMV not the courts. This bill would remove that mandatory
suspension and allow a person to immediately get an ignition
interlock device if he or she installs an IID and meets the
other requirements. It may also allow the installation during
any time of and any administrative suspension since it allows
the installation without "any suspension."
According to the latest DMV report on the DUI Management
Information System, DUI arrests in 2011 decreased by 8.0%
following decreases of 6.1% in 2010 and 2.9% in 2009.
(California DMV 2013 Annual Report of the California DUI
Management Information System p. iii)
The report further indicated that the 1-year recidivism rates
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for all first DUI offenders decreased to the lowest level seen
in the past 21years. The DUI re-offense rate for first
offenders arrested in 2010 was 46.1% lower than the re-offense
rate for first offenders arrested in 1990. The 1-year
re-offense rate for second DUI offenders continued to remain at
the lowest level in the past 21years. And recidivism decreased
from 9.7% in 1990 to 5.2% in 2010, a 46.4% relative decrease for
second DUI offenders. (Id atp. 33)
The 2013 and prior reports have all indicated a link between the
decline in DUIs and the mandatory suspension of a license
because a significant decline occurred after a mandatory
administrative suspension (APS) was indicated:
The re-offense rates of second offenders remain higher
than those of first offenders across all years
Previous DUI -MIS reports suggested that, while many
factors may be associated with the overall decline in
DUI incidents for both first and second offenders,
the reduction may largely be attributed to the
implementation of APS suspensions in 1990. An
evaluation (Rogers, 1997) of the California APS Law
documents recidivism reductions of up to 21.1% for
first offenders and 19.5% for repeat offenders,
attributable to the law. (Id 37)
The Committee may wish to consider whether it is good policy to
eliminate a sanction that has been studies and appears to reduce
the recidivism rate in California and replace it with a sanction
that the first study has indicated has no general deterrence and
the data has yet to be finally analyzed as to specific
deterrence.
7. Payment for IID
This bill purports to set up a sliding scale for payment of an
IID but it is not clear how it would work.
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First it is not clear who has the authority to verify whether
the IID installers are actually following the sliding scale set
up.
The sliding scale language in the bill describes the provider
absorbing portions of "the cost of the ignition interlock
device" for those that meet specified income limits. It does
not specify what is included in the cost of the device. The
device is one cost but the monitoring costs are additional. Are
these included?
The bill says that the cost of the IID can only be raised equal
to the Consumer Price Index but does not indicate where that
price shall currently start.
8. What if You Don't Own a Car?
This bill provides that a driver can indicate he or she does not
own a vehicle any longer in order to not be subject to the IID
requirement. However, that request must be made 30 days after
the DMV notifies the person of the requirement. 30 days may not
be enough time for an offender to realize the true cost of the
fines, fees, programs and now IID costs associated with a DUI.
An offender may at first think they can keep their car and not
drive it during the time of their license only to realize later
that they need to sell it or the cost is just not worth it when
they are facing the cost of the DUI. Is the 30 days realistic
for someone with a 2-year or more license suspension?
9. Permissive Requirement on Wet Reckless
A person arrested for a DUI who has a low blood-alcohol level,
or in cases where there may be a weakness in the proof, may plea
to a reckless driving with the agreement of the District
Attorney and the Court. This is known as a "wet reckless."
This bill would allow a court to order a person convicted of a
wet reckless to install an IID. This authority has not
previously existed.
10. Support
In support MADD states:
SB 61 will help to stop repeat DUI offenses as
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offenders who are on the device must prove their
sobriety when operating a vehicle on California
roadways. The interlock should only be removed after a
convicted drunk driver proves that he or she can drive
sober on California roadways. General deterrence of
drunk driving may not necessarily be accomplished by
DUI countermeasures unless such laws are highly
publicized. General deterrence typically occurs via
high visibility law enforcement activities such as
saturation patrols or well publicized sobriety
checkpoints.
11. Opposition
California Attorneys for Criminal Justice oppose this bill
stating:
CACJ was heavily involved in the negotiation of the
details of the pilot project which was adopted by AB
91 (Feuer). One key condition accepted by all key
parties was that a study was to be conducted by the
DMV to assess the effectiveness of the project. This
includes compliance rates, reasons for noncompliance
and the affordability gap. CACJ's concerns has been
that the many layers of fines and fees imposed on low
income individuals convicted of DUI results in further
negative consequences. If drivers are unable to pay
the fines in a timely manner, they are subject to
warrants or other enhanced actions.
The concept of mandatory interlock devices for
first-time offenders has been included in numerous
pieces of legislation over the years. These efforts
were unsuccessful in large part because studies
question whether IID's are effective deterrents to
future DUI's. In fact, a prior study by the California
Department of Motor Vehicles indicates that recidivism
was equal, if not higher, for those individuals who
installed an IID, thereby undermining significant
justification for the bills.
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In regards to the cost of interlock devices, although
a "sliding scale" was inserted as part of the
negotiation, we are continually hearing of clients who
find the installation cost of the IID, monthly
calibration fees, and other associated fees, as cost
prohibitive.
As drafted, even if these individuals register 100%
compliance with all other terms and conditions of
their sentence and probation, they will be unable to
obtain a valid driver's license if they cannot pay the
operational costs of the devices. We anticipate the
DMV report will address many of these concerns and the
Legislature can explore the department's findings to
determine the next-steps.
In essence, this bill is premature and should be
postponed until all stakeholders have the benefit of
the DMV report. This will allow us to collaborate to
identify effective strategies going forward. Mandatory
IID's is only one option. We should explore all
possibilities before adopting a statewide mandate.
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