IMMEDIATE ATTENTION: Municipal Police Radar and a new Steer Clear Law are on the Voting Slate in Pennsylvania

[Shelia at NMA]

Dear Pennsylvania NMA Member,

The Pennsylvania General Assembly (state legislature) is in the final stages of the session. Before leaving town for good, lawmakers need to finish the fiscal year budget and plug some gaping holes.

Please contact your PA Representative, PA Senator, and Governor Wolf about two bills SB607 and SB1281 (see below). Contact your elected officials today as lawmakers will likely move quickly on items like these. The online forms work best.

The main threat is still giving local jurisdictions police radar in SB607. As stated before, the bill does not require that speed limits be posted to the 85th percentile, the accepted gold standard.

A new threat is SB1281, which would revise the Steer Clear Law. It requires that in an emergency response area, you must move over one lane or reduce your speed to at least 20 mph BELOW the speed limit. Forcing all of these rapid lane changes and sudden braking maneuvers does not seem very safe. High traffic areas and areas with under posted speed limits are especially problematic. The current PA law is sufficient.

The passage of both bills would be a setback for motorists, as would the continuation of automated enforcement, which the state has been ramping up this past year.

When you contact your state representatives, be sure to make your views known on these issues. The NMA has always supported proper engineering solutions to highway safety issues, including speed limits based on the proven 85^th percentile principle, adequately timed yellow lights, and the use of stop signs only where needed.

There are a variety of bills and news reports out there that promote anti-driver policies. Too many to list. If you would like more information or wish to be more active with driving issues, please contact the national NMA office at nma@motorists.org.

The NMA will not send out repeated alerts unless something urgent springs forward. We encourage you to check in with your elected officials and tell them you support motorists’ rights in Pennsylvania. Also, tell them that you vote and follow these issues closely (It is an election year, after all).

Thank you for standing up for motorists’ rights in Pennsylvania. Please forward this alert to your family, friends, and neighbors. Encourage them to join the NMA—we need more members to keep on with this vital work!

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