ILLINOIS: the Red Light bill

OFF THE WIRE

 I heard that there is some confusion as to what "Affirmative Defense" means in the ONDGO on HB2860 It means that if you are at a stop light that does not sense your presence that if you proceed through it you can still be ticketed for going through a red light but you may take your ticket to court and ask the judge to dismiss the charge due to a faulty red light. In my original ONDGO for this bill (9) A-F is what would/could happen if you would receive a ticket.. Please use my 1st ONDGO on this bill for "Talking Points" when making your calls to your state legislators. These calls are very important If I haven't made this clear please give me a call and I will try to explain it again. Bob
  BOB MYERS LEGISLATIVE COORDINATOR ABATE OF ILLINOIS # 618-885-5769 Cell# 618-917-4919 bobkat63@frontiernet.net bobmabate@yahoo.com


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Gov. Quinn has decided to amendatory veto HB2860, the Red Light bill. His A.V. is attached so that you see his recommenced revisions. I told them No, we would go for the veto override. I didn't want to bring back a watered down version of the bill that was already watered down when we had to remove the city of Chicago and now some N.E.Senators want all of Cook County and the collar counties also exempted from this law. Enough is enough. Lets put a 4th Veto Override on our resume' of accomplishments. It is time to make your calls to your state representatives ---- http://www.ilga.gov/house/ And state senators ---- http://www.ilga.gov/senate/ We have had some changes in legislators and if your new one isn't listed like Rep Paul Evans (replaced Rep. Stevens of the 102nd) call your local telephone information. The following link will give you how your state representatives voted on the original bill and the senate amended version and how your state senators voted http://WWW.ilga.gov/legislation/votehistory.asp?DocNum=2860&DocTypeID=HB&LegID=60182&GAID=11&SessionID=84&GA=97&SpecSess= When you make your calls or better yet go visit them at their district offices ask them if they are going to support us and our safety with a YEA vote. We do not want any "Present" votes, we want YEAs Report their answers to your chapter legislative officers and they can report to the Region Coordinators then they can send me the results. I cannot handle calls from 63 legislative officers Sorry for the length of this but business is business. "Affirmative Defense" means law enforcement could still give you a ticket and you would have to go before the judge and plead your case referring to the new change in the Ill. Vehicle Code. This would be another "probable cause" to pull you over. Talking Points : Tell them this is about our SAFETY (1) Out of the 11 states that have this law, none have tried to rescind it. (2) Next to motorist making left hand turns and/or pulling out in front of us, intersections are where we are most vulnerable. (3) The rise in crashes and deaths that some predicted in those states that have the law has not happened and as a matter of fact motorcycle fatalities decreased across the nation last year (4) In 2010 IDOT recorded 360 rear end collisions with motorcycles that were slow/stopped in traffic. (5) In 2009 IDOT recorded 330 rear end collisions with motorcycles that were slow/stopped in traffic (6) In 2008 IDOT recorded 341 rear end collisions with motorcycles that were slow/stopped in traffic and the list goes on. (7) Cutting down rear end collisions would reduce Fatalities and Accidents in Illinois (8) We would also still be subject to a ticket for Reckless Driving if we would proceed recklessly and caused a potential unsafe condition. (9) If we took "Affirmative Defense" we could get a ticket and then have to : (a) Forfeit our license, (b) It would also be reported to our insurance company, (c) Get a lawyer, (d) Take off work to go to court to fight it, and possibly go from one end of this state to the other for court, depending on where you got the ticket and where you live (e) This would also be a burden on our over crowed courts and could cost the state money. (f) We would be Guilty until proven innocent (10) Motorcyclists pay the same gas taxes as other motorists and we deserve traffic control devices that work or be allowed to proceed with caution. (11) ABATE of Illinois would not be asking for this if we thought it would be counterproductive in reducing deaths and accidents as we are more concerned than anyone about our safety. (12) ABATE has always advocated the use of safety equipment but this VETO makes gloves, sleeves, long pants a harder sell in the summer where there are traffic signals not working properly. (13) In 1973 people said that a "right turn after a stop on a red light" would raise accidents/fatalities but we still have that law to help move traffic Go see you state legislators and get a yeah or nay from them and let us know their answer. Bob Myers