Federal officials want to improve crash investigations.
By Mark LaFlamme
Staff Writer

Several national safety groups are urging police around the country to begin documenting all vehicle crashes involving $1,000 damage or more.

It is unknown how the recommendation will be received from state-to-state. But in Maine, there should be little to ponder – police departments here are already required to complete crash reports if $1,000 or more in damage is sustained.

Local and state police also report contributing factors such as road conditions, alcohol use by drivers, safety equipment use and any possible distractions that may have led to a crash.

It is exactly how the federal groups want all police departments to handle vehicle crashes.

“If states implement this new crash reporting threshold, we will have a much better sense of what is really occurring on our nation’s roadways,” said Barbara Harsha, executive director of the Governor’s Highway Safety Association.

Some states only document crashes if there is death, significant injury or enough damage to the vehicle that it has to be towed.

Termed the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria Guideline, the recommendation seeks to create more consistency in crash reporting so that safety officials can chart trends. The idea, according to Harsha, is to develop new laws and strategies aimed at reducing deaths and injuries on the nation’s highways

The proposed guidelines are also designed to help police and policy makers better gauge the impact of driver distractions. That would include making records of drivers who were distracted by cell phones or pagers, navigation devices or palm pilots, radios or other passengers.

Harsha said the inclusion of that data is particularly timely given that numerous states are considering legislation to ban motorists from using hand-held cell phones while driving.

“We don’t really have any idea as to the scope of the driver distraction problem,” Harsha said.

Although police in Maine document the fact if it is learned a crash occurred due to distraction by a driver with a cell phone, there is one thing the state does not yet have: a law forbidding adult drivers from using the devices. Currently, only beginning drivers are banned from talking on hand-held cell phones while behind the wheel.

The proposed guidelines announced Tuesday were developed by the Governor’s Highway Safety Association, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Federal Highway Administration and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

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