Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 22, 1993 TAG: 9301220269
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: WARREN FISKE and BONNIE V. WINSTON STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
HOUSE PANEL BACKS LOWER LEGAL DUI LEVEL
Virginia would have one of the toughest drunken-driving laws in the nation under legislation endorsed Thursday by the House Courts of Justice Committee.The bill, which the same committee rejected last year, provides that anyone cited for driving with a 0.08 percent blood-alcohol content would be presumed drunk by courts. It would be up to individuals to prove otherwise.
The law would keep intact current provisions for automatic drunken-driving convictions for anyone driving with a blood-alcohol content of 0.10 percent or higher.
Under the law now, there is no presumption of impairment for people arrested for erratic driving with blood-alcohol levels below the 0.10 percent level. As a result, judges are reluctant to convict people with levels below the threshold, said Sen. Kenneth Stolle, R-Virginia Beach.
Driving experts testified that a driver with an 0.08 percent blood-alcohol level is four times more likely to have an accident than one who has had nothing to drink.
Virginia would join 11 states in which drivers with 0.08 percent levels are either presumed drunk or automatically convicted.
The legislation was unanimously passed in the state Senate last year, but defeated in the House committee. Stolle said the panel was swayed this year by dramatic testimony from Frank Starr, a Chesapeake resident whose 25-year-old brother died in an automobile accident in 1991.
Starr said the driver of the car that struck his brother had a blood-alcohol content of 0.07 percent. The driver told police he could not remember events leading up to the accident, Starr said.
Meanwhile, bills limiting most individuals to one handgun purchase a month were formally introduced Thursday in both chambers of the General Assembly, as behind-the-scenes bargaining intensified on the session's hottest topic.
The proposal, which has the backing of Democratic Gov. Douglas Wilder and Republican U.S. Attorney Richard Cullen, was introduced with 29 co-patrons in the House, which has 100 members. Thirteen of the 40 senators co-sponsored their version.
Most of the co-patrons were from major population centers in the eastern half of the state. Public support for gun control is highest in those areas, which have been hardest hit by increases in crimes involving guns.
Lawmakers predicted that coalitions for and against the gun-a-month bill will begin to jell within the next few days. Opponents of the bill are expected to submit alternate proposals soon.
Representatives of organizations for teachers, principals, school superintendents, parent-teacher organizations and college faculty were among those endorsing Wilder's anti-crime initiatives at a Capitol news conference.
"Unarmed child pugilists do not kill one another. Armed children do," said Rob Jones, president of the Virginia Education Association. "We must react to the repulsive specter of children killing children with strong and appropriate action."
\ Earlier raises proposed
\ Saying they want to boost the "day-to-day morale" of state workers, Republican senators called Thursday for $23 million in budget cuts that would permit the state to give its employees 2 percent pay raises eight months earlier than Gov. Douglas Wilder has proposed.
"Let's not promise, but deliver," said Sen. Robert Russell, R-Chesterfield, during a news conference.
The Republican group has not taken a position on raises for Virginia's public schoolteachers; Wilder has included nothing for them in the budget.
Wilder's proposed amendments to the state's 1993-94 budget would provide $14 million to raise the salaries of the state's 86,000 classified employees by 2 percent on Dec. 1. The governor also wants to provide $10.7 million to give one-time bonuses of $250 to $500.
The GOP senators said Thursday that the $10.7 million ought to go directly to salaries, building the pay base of workers and allowing the state to attract and retain qualified people.
The Republicans said they will introduce amendments to cut $2.5 million from the state Aviation Department; $2 million from the state Department of Personnel and Training; $3 million from high-occupancy-vehicle lane advertising and $1.8 million from the Department of Environmental Quality to generate money to fund the raise beginning April 1.
State employees got their first raises - 2 percent - in almost two years on Dec. 1.
In other action:
The House of Delegates voted 85-7 to approve a bill stating the program areas, including vocational-technical education, that must be taught in public secondary schools.
The Senate Transportation Committee endorsed a bill that would allow law-enforcement officers to use laser speed detectors, which state police say pick up speeding trucks 4,000 to 5,000 feet away and speeding cars from 1,000 to 3,000 feet away.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Keywords:
GENERAL ASSEMBLY 1993