New Laws Designed To Make Colorado Roads Safer

July 9, 2004

Two new laws designed to make Colorado's roads safer and reduce the number of traffic fatalities went into effect July 1.

House Bill 1021 by Rep. Bob Briggs, R-Westminster, will reduce the amount of alcohol a driver can consume before becoming legally drunk while HB 1017 by Rep. Gayle Berry, R-Grand Junction, will put greater emphasis on driver education courses and toughen rules for learner permits.

HB 1021 reduces the blood-alcohol threshold from 0.10 percent to 0.08 percent. With passage of the bill, Colorado becomes the 48th state to adopt a 0.08 blood-alcohol standard. The federal government has told states that they will lose federal highway funds if they fail to pass the tougher restriction. A compromise retains Colorado's lesser driving-while-ability-impaired standard of 0.05 percent but allows those charged with DWAI to plea down to a nonalcoholic offense.

"In states that have already adopted the lower 0.08 standard, we have seen a 30 percent reduction in number of traffic fatalities," Briggs said. In 2002, nearly one-third (249 of 742) of the traffic fatalities in Colorado were alcohol-related, according to the Colorado Department of Transportation.

HB 1021 also allows retail liquor stores to conduct "tastings" and restaurant customers to re-cork and take home unfinished wine bottles.

HB 1017 has three purposes, Berry said. First, it increases the time from six months to one year that someone under 18 must have a learner's permit before they can obtain a regular driver's license. "The accident rate for 16-year-old drivers is over 2-1/2 times as high as for 18-year-old drivers, so this change will increase the amount of supervised training time that teens go through in order to get their regular driver's license," Berry said.

Second, HB 1017 provides an incentive for teens to get their learner's permit earlier by completing driver's education courses. If they haven't taken driver's ed, they must wait until they're 17 to get their learner's permit, but HB 1017 provides that if they pass a four-hour driver's awareness program, they can get their permit at 15-1/2. If they are enrolled in a driver's ed course, they can obtain their instruction permit at age 15.

Third, HB 1017 increases the time the instruction permit is valid to three years, giving parents more control over when their teenager actually gets their license. "If the teen is not ready, parents can insist that they wait until they are," Berry said.