AUGUSTA – A tougher Maine seat-belt law will save lives and reduce accident injuries, according to dozens of medical professionals, police and auto safety representatives who went to Augusta on Tuesday in support of a stronger law.
Gov. John Baldacci and a lawmaker from Union have proposed changes that would allow police to pull over motorists not wearing belts. Currently, police can ticket someone for not buckling up only if they’ve been pulled over for another reason.
Saying it’s in line with his goal for healthier Mainers, Baldacci has also recommended increasing fines from $50 to $200.
“A meaningful dent in someone’s pocketbook” is the only way to convince some people to buckle up, Mary Ellen Peaslee of the Maine Driver Education Association testified at Tuesday’s public hearing on the proposal.
Craig Poulin, chief of the Maine State Police, said this change could save approximately 40 lives each year in Maine.
Between 1986 and 2002 in Maine, Poulin said that 414 people died from homicides, 561 from AIDS, 2,749 from suicide and 3,397 from motor vehicle crashes.
“Approximately 680 of those 3,397 people – roughly the population of Islesboro and many other Maine towns – would have lived had they used a safety belt,” he said.
Only 59 percent
Seat-belt use statewide is 59 percent, one of the lowest rates in the country, Poulin said. Passing a stiffer law would be the easiest, least costly and most effective way to save lives on Maine roads, he said.
Dr. Lani Graham, acting director of the Maine Bureau of Health, agreed, praising the “humble seat belt as a piece of mechanical wizardry that is as good at saving lives as LifeFlight, the defibrillator” and other more high-tech inventions.
Research shows that seat belts reduce the risk of fatal injuries in crashes by 45 percent, and that unbelted crash victims ejected were 41 times more likely to be hospitalized or die, she said.
Under a stronger law, seat belt use would significantly increase, fewer people would die and taxpayers would save millions of dollars in health-care costs, Graham said.
Charles Satterfield of the AAA in Vermont told members of the Transportation Committee that he’d traveled to Augusta to share the Green Mountain State’s mistake. Instead of passing a seat-belt law like the one proposed by Baldacci and state Sen. Christine Savage, R-Union, the state of Vermont has poured money into education campaigns that encourage motorists to buckle up.
Seat belt use peaks temporary, but then declines, Satterfield said. He asked Maine “not to do it the Vermont way. Please pass this legislation.”
Others speakers supporting the law included representatives for LifeFlight, the Maine Hospital Association, AAA in Maine, emergency room doctors, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers and the American College of Surgeons.
Proposal unfair’
Two spoke against the proposal.
Rick Fayen of Starks said a higher fine for not wearing a seat belt is unfair. A better way, he said, would be “to simply withhold quick medical attention in case of accident” when someone did not wear a seat belt. If seat belts are so important, why aren’t they required on school buses? he asked.
And Dana Marriner of Augusta said he feels bad about the tragedies on highways, but questioned how he and others “lived this long without being required to wear seat belts.” Marriner said he does not regularly wear a seat belt, but buckles up his grandchildren because they’re too young to decide. “I should have the right to make my own decision,” he said.
The Transportation Committee is expected to vote soon on the bill, L.D. 80, before it heads to the House and Senate floors for votes.
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