Current Issues & Legislation

For current information on any piece of California legislation, click here.

To find your California Representatives, click here.

SB 435 - What now?

Wow, EIGHT Amendments Later and the bill has now been sent back to the Senate Transportation Committee. The year for compliance has been extended to 2013. The hearing will be on Monday the 23rd of August, and the Committee will either concur with the amendments or not, but they cannot make any new amendments. ABATE's, (our faithful Lobbyist), Jim Lombardo, will be there.

What can you do to help at this point?

You can write your individual letters to the Governor of California, and request him to not sign the bill.

We'll be sending out Action Alerts as more news becomes available, sign up for Action Alerts here.

To download a copy of the official ABATE press release, click here.

To view the latest amendments on the official State of CA website, click here

To join a Facebook cause to defeat SB 435, click here

Thanks again to everyone who has taken action up to this point, we couldn't have stalled it as well as we have without you!

FREEWAY “CHANGEABLE MESSAGE SIGNS”
by John Del Santo

The ‘E’ in ABATE stands for “education.” One of the goals we reach for is Motorcycle Awareness….educating the driving public so that they are more aware of the motorcycles sharing the road with them, and less likely to run us over.

A few years back some of our ABATE members on a cross-country run saw the electronic highway signs in several states being used for motorcycle awareness messages when they were not being used for Amber Alert and Buckle-up messages. Upon returning to California we started a project of convincing the Department of Transportation (DOT) here that this would certainly save some lives. Imagine the millions of people every week that would be seeing motorcycle awareness messages!

Years went by, sending constant letters and making hundreds of phone calls, and recruiting other people into the action. The word “no” got to be a mantra with the folks we were dealing with, banging our heads against the wall.

And TODAY, February 11, 2010, there they were! Big grins on our faces… Big electric signs up and down the freeways and highways of the state! Different messages, most of which were penned and sent in by ABATE members. Send your THANKS to the people that were involved…. Shamiel Coleman with the CHP Office of Special Projects, and the California Motorcycle Safety Program, ABATE’s Mike Osborn, & Jim Lombardo, CHP Commssioner Farrow, Sgt Mike Thomason, and Ron Miller of the Office of Traffic Safety, and big kudos to the ABATE members who sent their e-mails, phone calls and words of encouragement. Perseverance! Any motorcyclist whose life is lengthened by the Motorcycle Awareness message on these signs adds to the Karma of this assembled crew. Let them know that we appreciate the time and effort invested, and pitch in on the next project during May, which is Motorcycle Awareness & Safety Month.

The Signs will be lit with Motorcycle Awareness messages for at least a week during May for "Motorcycle Awareness Month," and for about a week during June to Honor "Ride your bike to work" week (June 21). ABATE is working on getting our messages posted on the signs for at least one or two days each month.

NOTE: We encourage everyone to send a note of thanks to the hyperlinked names above. They're set to open a new message in your default e-mail program pre-addressed to the appropriate recipient. If this causes a problem with your software set-up, use the addresses below:

Shamiel Coleman: SCOLEMAN@CHP.CA.GOV

CHP Commissioner Farrow: pspringer@chp.ca.gov

Sgt. Mike Thomason: MTHOMASON@CHP.CA.GOV

Ron Miller: Ron.Miller@ots.ca.gov

AB 1205 - Helmet Law Modification

AB 1205 did not have the votes to get approved by the Assembly Transportation Committee and died there. ABATEPAC will be working on a new helmet law modification bill after the 2010 elections are over and we have a chance to evaluate the new playing field in Sacramento.

AB 751 - Motor Vehicle Theft

This bill creates six new one-year enhancements for the theft of a vehicle under specified circumstances. ABATE was asked for our support and the PAC voted to tentatively agree based on feedback from other affected organizations such as firefighters and other emergency first responders. Go here and search for AB 751 to read the summary and text of the current bill.

SB 1134 - Child Passenger on a Motorcycle

Current law already prohibits carrying a passenger on other than the seat or in a sidecar. This bill would likely have resulted in age limits on motorcycle passengers but, after hearing our objections the author decided to drop it for this session. You can read the existing text of the bill here.

AB 1951 - Accidents Resulting in Bodily Injury

This bill was originally intended to provide for increased penalties for motorists who caused bodily injury to pedestrians and bicyclists. ABATE agreed to endorse it after the language was changed to make the penalties apply to injuries caused to any road user, including motorcyclists. To read the summary and amendments go here and type in AB 1951.

AB 1952 - Motor Vehicle Instruction Permits

A couple of years ago ABATE was approached by the bereaved uncle of a teenager who died after crashing his motorcycle into a wall near his home, wanting us to sponsor legislation that would require minors to take an approved training course before they could get an instruction permit to operate a motorcycle. The boy's father was an experienced motorcyclist and so it appears it was a freak accident rather than something that could have been prevented by a basic rider training course. At the time we voted not to support the legislation.

Existing law provides that anyone under 21 has to take an approved training course before they can get ther M1 endorsement. AB 1952 was introduced to make it mandatory that anyone under 21 had to take an approved training course before they could even get a motorcycle instruction permit. It appears to have been amended to remove that requirement and instead close a loophole that allowed minors to continuously renew their temporary motorcycle instruction permit until age 21, bypassing the need to get an M1 endorsement on their driver's license.

You can read the latest version of the bill by going here and typing in AB 1952

Stop the Ban on the Sale of Youth Sized ATVs and Dirt Bikes!

The sale of youth-sized ATVs and dirt bikes remains banned. We continue to need your help to persuade Congress to overturn the ban. In a January report to Congress the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) unanimously asked Congress to provide flexibility to grant exclusions that would permanently allow the sale of youth OHVs. Now it is time for Congress to act!

Click the Take Action link below to send a letter to your Members of Congress and to the Members of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation urging them to provide for a categorical exemption for youth OHVs or to provide the authority to CPSC to exclude youth OHVs from the law.