Nearly 12 years after a grieving mother approached state Sen. Rosemary Brown at a community meeting and asked her to support a tougher distracted driving law, Gov. Josh Shapiro on Wednesday signed a ban on using handheld electronics behind the wheel.
Eileen Miller’s 21-year-old son was killed in 2010 when a distracted truck driver crossed a highway median in Monroe County and slammed into his car. Brown, R-Monroe, who was then a new state representative, said Miller’s tears and determination moved her to keep pushing the legislation through six legislative sessions.
“I knew it was right,” Brown said during a signing ceremony Wednesday at the Pennsylvania Capitol in Harrisburg. “And I knew it was absolutely necessary to do our best to change the behavior of drivers behind the wheel when using a cell phone to prevent crashes.”
Law allows police to ticket drivers using cell phones, tablets while driving
Named for Miller’s son, Paul Miller Jr., the new law allows police to stop and ticket drivers spotted using handheld smartphones, tablets and other devices while on the road. It takes effect in one year but for the first year police will issue warnings. After that, the offense carries a $50 fine.
“I got it done, Paul,” Eileen Miller said, recalling that she had made a promise to her son when she identified his body. “This is not just for Paul. This is for every family that is in Pennsylvania that doesn’t have to have state troopers knocking on their door to tell them that their loved one was killed by something so preventable as distracted driving.”
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Law also includes efforts to study possible racial profiling
The law, which is the 29th such measure in the nation, also requires state police and municipal police in towns of 5,000 people or more to gather data on the race, ethnicity, gender and age of a driver and other details during a traffic stop.
That amendment to Brown’s bill, passed in the state House in April, was a priority of the Black Legislative Caucus, said Chairperson Napoleon Nelson, D-Montgomery. The reporting requirement increases transparency and ensures that when police take action to ensure road safety, “that they are not doing so at the risk of marginalized communities.”
The legislative effort to prevent distracted driving predates Paul Miller Jr.’s death, Shapiro said before signing the law. In 2008, Jacy Good was driving home with her parents after graduating from Muhlenberg College when a distracted driver caused a tractor-trailer to swerve into their car.
Good’s parents died and she was left permanently disabled, Shapiro said. Meeting Good persuaded him to sponsor legislation to end distracted driving. And while Pennsylvania enacted a ban on texting while driving in 2012, other uses of smartphones remained legal.
“People like Jacy and Eileen believed and never ever, ever gave up. And thank God, they didn’t. We’re all better off because of their determination,” Shapiro said, noting that the 11,000 distracted driving crashes last year in Pennsylvania exceeded the number of crashes involving alcohol.
Cell phone, electronics ban while driving effective in other states
In states that have passed similar bans, the number of distracted driving crashes has declined significantly, Shapiro said.
Rep. Donna Bullock, D-Philadelphia, a former chairperson of the Black Legislative Caucus, said a renewed effort to pass distracted driving legislation coincided with a national focus on police shootings and other incidents stemming from traffic stops involving Black and brown people.
Bullock said she looked to Massachusetts, where state officials had conducted a pilot study on whether a distracted driving law would have the potential to increase pretextual traffic stops based on the race or skin color of the driver.
“What we found … is we couldn’t do the pilot because we didn’t have the statewide collection, coordinated collection of police data or traffic stop data,” Bullock said.
The amendment championed by Bullock and Nelson will keep police accountable while providing data to improve public safety, Shapiro said, adding that it is an example of what Democrats and Republicans can accomplish when they come together to make Pennsylvanians’ lives “a little bit better.”
“Compromise is how we make our roadways safer,” Shapiro said. “Compromise is how we hear the pleas of a mom that are ultimately going to save the lives of other children across this commonwealth. Compromise is how we get things done.”
Peter Hall has been a journalist in Pennsylvania and New Jersey for more than 20 years, most recently covering criminal justice and legal affairs for The Morning Call in Allentown. His career at local newspapers and legal business publications has taken him from school board meetings to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and many points of interest between. He earned a degree in journalism from Susquehanna University.
Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
