November, 2015
Cally Houck mother of two daughters killed in a rental Chrysler vehicle has a petition on legislation that has gained the support of nearly 200,000 signers. But Fiat – Chrysler is fighting back – and our continued support is needed.
November, 2015
National Law Journal reports: “Takata agreed to pay $70 million in cash and another $130 million, should it fail to comply with the terms of the consent order. An independent monitor selected by NHTSA will oversee Takata’s compliance with the consent order for the next five years.” See
Please see consent order p. 8 for schedule of payments. Only $20 million to be paid before 2016 election. Senators Blumenthal and Markey noted that 8 deaths have been reported so far and that“Meager fines do nothing more than change the costs of doing business and provide no meaningful deterrence…”
For Immediate Release:
November 3, 2015
BLUMENTHAL, MARKEY STATEMENT ON NHTSA-TAKATA SETTLEMENT
Takata will be fined maximum $200million in penalties for concealing information about deadly safety defect in airbags
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), members of the Senate Commerce Committee, issued the following statement today on the Consent Order issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to Takata Corporation, which fines Takata up to $200million for the company’s failure to immediately report a known airbag safety defect, which has caused eight deaths and dozens of injuries. Takata must pay $70million and faces up to an additional $130million in fines for failure to comply with NHTSA’s order. NHTSA also for the first time used its authority to accelerate recall repairs.
“Meager fines do nothing more than change the costs of doing business and provide no meaningful deterrence for continuing reprehensible and irresponsible behavior that costs countless preventable injuries and lives. Today’s action provides further evidence that the cap on civil penalties levied by NHTSA must be eliminated by Congress, and we must also reform the criminal penalties associated with concealing life-saving information about defects from the public. We have a rare opportunity to address this in the Surface Transportation Bill, but Republicans have instead failed to pass meaningful reforms to change the behavior of auto companies that choose profit over human life.”
The Senators are right. Compare the DOT Settlement with the DOT Policy Guidance of $9.4 million value of a statistical life. Eight deaths so far multiplied by $9.4 million = $75.2 million. See DOT Policy athttps://www.transportation.gov/sites/dot.gov/files/docs/VSL2015_0.pdf
At least the agreement carried provisions that the fines would not be tax deductible.
November, 2015
The Star-Telegram reports:
“U.S. Rep. Roger Williams fired back Thursday against questions raised about an amendment he made to a transportation bill last week.
In an article that ran in the Star-Telegram, the Center for Public Integrity stated that Williams, a longtime local car dealer, amended the transportation bill approved by the House to let auto dealers lend or rent vehicles that are up for safety recalls….
Although Williams made references to recalls like the stickers on the windshield visor, the exemption for the auto dealers applies to any recall, said Clarence Ditlow III, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a Washington-based advocacy group.
“His examples are a red herring,” Ditlow said, adding that the examples Williams gave of typos in manuals and stickers are fixed by the auto companies sending the auto owner a letter — which means that the car would not be “under recall” for those things.
The reason for the original Senate amendment, Ditlow said, is the concern of Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., about a rental car under recall in 2004 that resulted in the death of two sisters. Raechel and Jacqueline Houck, 24 and 20, of Santa Cruz were killed while driving a recalled Chrysler PT Cruiser with a steering problem from Enterprise Rent-A-Car. Boxer opposes Williams’ amendment.
Ditlow said: “It’s a horrible amendment. No one should be given a loaner car on an outstanding recall. It’s a crash waiting to happen.”
Williams’ amendment is part of the highway bill in conference between the House and Senate and is expected to be concluded by Dec. 4.
Henry Jasny, senior vice president of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, when told that Williams was an auto dealer, said: “Has a self-interest. It’s bad for his clients, his customers who he gives a loaner to. We don’t think any car should be rented or loaned to the public without a repair.”
Williams said there’s no ethics investigation against him.
“I chose to apply some common sense to legislation that specifically intended to further over regulate small businesses and increase burdens on Main Street while they are still trying to survive in this Obama economy,” he said. “My minor, technical amendment reined in the federal government, and it passed the House unanimously.
“I remain committed to continuing to fight for my district, for my state and for all Americans against an administration that continues to choke small businesses.”
The Center for Public Integrity “stands 100 percent behind its reporting on this story,” its Executive Editor Gordon Witkin said.” See
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/politics-government/article45527889.html
November, 2015
Report CardHere is what is being considered in Congress for our “safety” for the next 6 years. Advocates have identified the good and bad sections along with Representatives of Congress by name and Congressional District. The Report Card is attached.
Crash Deaths By Congressional District Citizens can use the Crash Death Map Tool to see how many deaths occurred in each member’s district over the past decade. See http://www.arcgis.com/explorer/?open=e21e612d64654d75943f85a1a6035472&extent=-19044679.7278955,530211.736810937,-3588091.0679062,8231341.58761403
Claybrook Warning As Joan Claybrook warned recently, in crashes the nation can expect to suffer the loss of 200,000 American lives and 12 million people injured over the next 6 years. See Claybrook Testimony attached.
Lou
November, 2015
What if people created WANTED posters for members of Congress that place Deadly Loopholes in safety legislation that predictably will cause deaths to Americans?
WANTED posters have a long American history. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wanted_poster
See the latest outrage and help get signatures on the petition by the mother who lost two daughters in an unrepaired defective rental vehicle.
Statement of Jackie Gillan, President
Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety
Statement on Release of New Study, “Unclogging America’s Arteries 2015”
November 23, 2015
Today, the American Highway Users Alliance released a new study, “Unclogging America’s Arteries 2015, Prescriptions for Healthier Highways.” Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety (Advocates) supports efforts to promote healthier highways and reduce congestion. Solving roadway bottlenecks involves adequate funding but also advancing laws, policies and programs to reduce highway crashes. A major source of roadway congestion is slowed or stopped traffic when a crash occurs. Serious truck and car crashes often result in deaths and injuries that require the immediate assistance of emergency responders on the scene, shutting down or re-routing traffic, and causing hours of delay for all motorists.
This is the reason our organization and coalition partners are deeply concerned about the anti-safety rollbacks and attacks contained in the DRIVE Act, H.R. 22, now being negotiated in a conference with House and Senate Members. In 2013, the most recent year final figures are available, there were nearly 5.7 million police-reported crashes across the United States resulting in 32,719 fatalities and over 2 million injuries. Early estimates from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) predict a 9.5% increase in crash fatalities for the first quarter of 2015, compared to the first quarter of 2014 projections. These crashes come with an annual cost of $836 billion, amounting to a “crash tax” of approximately $2,600 for every person in the United States. Congestion caused by crashes, including travel delay, excess fuel consumption, greenhouse gases and criteria pollutants totaled $28 billion (NHTSA). To make our roads truly “healthier,” we need Congress to advance safety laws and policies that will address the economic and emotional costs of crashes as they deliberate over the DRIVE Act.
Unfortunately, both the House and Senate versions of the DRIVE Act ignore available solutions that will prevent crashes and instead, include provisions that will set back safety. For example, both bills include a provision that will allow teen truck and bus drivers to get behind the wheel of an 80,000 big rig or passenger-carrying bus and operate in interstate commerce despite overwhelming public opposition and compelling research showing the unacceptable high crash risk of young drivers. A public opinion poll released last week shows that 77% of the public opposes this proposal (conducted by ORC International). Additionally, there is a lethal loophole in the bill that will allow car dealerships to provide loaner or rental cars to consumers even though they have safety recalls that have not been fixed. The public resoundingly rejects this idea, with 86% of the public opposing.
Furthermore, the bills provide exemptions from federal rules on the limits of working hours for truck driver hours and truck size and weights for certain industries such as logging, ready mix concrete, dairy and construction materials. It is time for Congress to get serious about reducing the growing carnage on our roads and highways especially when we have commonsense and cost-effective solutions at hand. To seriously unclog our nation’s arteries and achieve healthier highways, Congress needs to listen to the public, not to trucking and auto interests that prescribe remedies that jeopardize public safety.
Congress has failed to protect Americans for way too long. See
https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/assets/MonthlyReportforJuly2015final.pdf
A mapping tool, free to the public, provides crash fatalities by Congressional district for the years 2004 – 2013. Available at https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/CrashDeathMappingTools.php
There you will see that in 2013, in the district currently “represented” by car dealer Roger Williams there were about 2 crash deaths per week.
Heck of a job!
