Unfortunately, the House saw fit to water the bill down top such a state that it only applied to teenage drivers. That is all well and good, but the last several drivers that could not maintain their speed or lane position near my bike were definitely not teenage drivers. The House version would do nothing about the majority of the people who are ignoring the road while they operate their mobile offices. As you have probably discerned from my language, just like many of you, I do not agree with this dilution of a good bill that can save an innocent rider from getting killed or maimed by being cut off or run over.

The Senate agrees with us on this issue, and refuses to concur with the House amendments. We have been asked to lend our voices to the call for the House to recede from their version and agree to the Senate version. Riders need to contact their representatives as soon as possible and ask them to protect the innocent motoring public from the irresponsible operators by restoring (SSB 6345) to it’s original Senate version. To locate your representative go to http://apps.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/Default.aspx and follow the instructions. Lets let our voices be heard and get this fixed.

Until next time,

Ride Safe and Legislate Well,

“Texas” Larry Walker

Government Relations Specialist

Washington Road Riders Association

wrraleg@aol.com

I note that the profiling bill promoted by the Confederation of Clubs and ABATE of Washington, HB 2511, was *overwhelmingly* embraced by the House of Representatives. Note that there are 98 members in the State House. All but TWO voted in favor of a bill that said it’s not OK to single out citizens for preemptive stops because they *look* like members of a certain group, i.e. bikers.

Before I say anything else: please contact your House representatives and *thank them* for voting for this bill. I was in Olympia on Wednesday (to meet with the Director of DOL and her staff) and made a point of visiting my members’ offices. Call, email, write – but thank them.

I’ve watched this bill try to make its way through the Legislature in years past. It’s seemed that its biggest obstacle was not the language of the bill itself, but the language of those who spoke about the bill. In years past, there was a lot of anger, a lot of angst, a lot of finger-pointing.

Not this year.

This year, there was a lot of considered conversation about the rights of free men and women in a democratic society. All of us – patch holders, alternative club-style riders, and rank-and-file independent bikers – spoke to our legislators in measured and polite tones about civil rights and ‘the America that made America famous’.

We struck a chord, and overwhelmingly won the House. Our lack of victory in the Senate was, in my opinion, no fault of the bill or our approach to it. It was an artifact of a short session with too much to do and the short news cycle we’ve all come to know and [feel something about]. In truth, the bill did not lose in the Senate. It just never got a chance to win.

I’m encouraged not only by the progress made by this bill, but by the progress made by *us*. A lot of motorcyclists across a broad spectrum of our sometimes divided constituency came together and BLEW OUT the House. On Black Thursday, I had the pleasure of meeting with – and standing with – leaders from diverse segments of the motorcycle community, and I believe that our consensus carried the day.

It’s unfortunate that we have enjoyed this partial victory at the end of a biennium, and we do not have another session to fight the fight of HB2511. Nonetheless, I do not think we are done, I do think we can build on the success of this session, and I look forward to working with my brothers and sisters in the motorcycle community to protect the civil rights of those who ride from discrimination and selective enforcement.

We must all hang together – or we shall certainly hang separately. I hope you will join us for our regular meeting on Wednesday, March 31, to discuss this and other stories from the 2010 legislative session. — Ian

If you were subscribed to the old email newsletter you should be subscribed to the new version as well.

The new default format is an excerpt of the post and a link to view the full post on the website. It’s light on your inbox and speedy to send. But you have options… You can now select to receive full text of each post in either plain text or spiffy HTML.

You can begin by following this link and registering.

(Or click on the Register button over there in the upper right hand corner of the web page.)

Sign up using the email address you’d like to use to receive the newsletter.

Register for the WRRA website and the newsletter.

In just a few minutes you’ll get an email from WRRA with a temporary password. Click on the link in the email and log in to roadriders.org.

On the profile page you can give yourself a nickname and provide a little info that will appear when you comment on posts. You can also change your password at the bottom of the profile page if you’d like.

To manage your newsletter subscriptions click on Subscriptions in the left hand column.

Select the format and categories that you'd like to subscribe to.

Choose your preferred format by clicking on one of the buttons. You can add or subtract categories by clicking on the check boxes.

Just FYI the “Sticky” category is added to posts that we want to stay on our front page. But you don’t really care about that.

Click Update Preferences and you’ll soon be getting just the news you want, just the way you want it.

On the other hand if you’re just ducky with the way things are now. We’re good with that too. No need to do anything.

Problems, solutions, comments, and other remarks to webmaster@roadriders.org.

Lara H.

4010 196th St SW
Lynnwood, WA 98036

Join us in the meeting room

HB 2617 has two sections in it that are detrimental to the motorcycling community. Section 151 eliminates the Motorcycle Safety Education Advisory Board, and sections 157/158 eliminate the Nonhighway and Off-Road Vehicle Activities Advisory Committee. Riders must have been making calls, because that bill saw a lot of buzz. Representative Hunt, chair of the house State Government and Tribal Affairs committee informed me that the committee was going to do a paring down of the bill prior to the hearing and issue a list of the sections that would be removed in the proposed substitute. Not surprisingly, he was good to his word, Before the committee was convened Mr. Hunt read all assembled the list of things that were being pared out. Both section 151 and sections 157/158 were on the list. (OPR-BC to Remove) I do not when the bill will be scheduled for executive action, but I am sure that it will be reported out of the committee. After all, ther is money to be saved, and we do have a budget crisis.

Here are the points that I had been pressing home to each member:
1.All operations of either board, no matter how slight, are fully funded by the stakeholder groups, with zero operating monies coming out of General or Transportation funds.
2.Both boards are fully supported by the stake holders.
3.Both boards facilitate a direct line of communication between the stake holders and the agency that oversees each program.
4.In a climate in which the average citizen feels disconnected from government, the abolishment of these two well functioning and effective boards sends the wrong message to people.

The tolling bill, HB 2093 is a different sort of animal. The legislature is hesitant to direct the Washington State Transportation Commission on how they do their routine business. During the course of my conversations the general feeling is that we need to address our concerns to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge – Citizen Advisory Committee in lieu of seeking a legislative solution. The Advisory Committee at least recommended that tolls remain the same, a recommendation that the Transportation Commission chose to categorically ignore in lieu of actually raising the rates across the board. Perhaps it is time for us to press for a hearing in House Transportation so that we can have a public discussion of how tolling policy is governed. I will definitely be in touch with Representative Clibborn’s office this coming Monday, and it would not hurt if riders started calling their representatives to ask them to request that House Transportation hear the bill.

There are two bills in the works, SB 6345, with the companion bill HB 2635, which makes using a non hands free cell phone or texting while driving a primary offense. Imagine that, actually telling the multi-tasking cager to pay attention to the driving. Distracted driving is perhaps one of the most serious issues facing the motoring public as a whole. Both bills were heard in committee on the 18th, and it looks like the Senate Transportation Committee will move the bill out next week. The executive board of the Washington Road Riders Association appeared before both committees in support of this measure. This is not one of those “feel good” things that protects someone from themselves. This is a proposal to reach right into the wallet of the idiots who feel that they have much better things to do than pay attention while they are herding a 5,000 pound SUV across the nation’s highways.

ABATE of Washington is continuing to pursue helmet usage reform. (HB 1964) The current version includes language that would require either motorcycle safety training of mandatory medical coverage if a rider does not wish to wear a helmet. No matter your opinion, this is a moot point. Neither Representative Clibborn (House Transportation) nor Senator Haugen (Senate Transportation) will bring the bill up for a hearing, so the main reason for having a bill is to give context to the conversation about freedom of choice. In my own personal opinion, the call for medical insurance is unnecessary, as there is no real public burden involved that merits the governmental intrusion into the lives of the citizens.

The final bill that is getting buzz, not only here in Olympia but also in the press is HB 2511. This issue is being championed by the Confederation of Clubs, the US Defenders, and ABATE of Washington. It address profiling of people “using the fact that a person rides a motorcycle or wears motorcycle-related paraphernalia as a factor in deciding to stop and question, take enforcement action, arrest, or search a person or vehicle with or without legal basis under the United States Constitution or the Washington state Constitution.” That was quoting directly from the legislation. The WRRA is deferring the official conversation to the people who are actively championing this cause, as they are definitely the subject matter experts. (Normally, when I end up on the side of the road it more readily involves something akin to “failure to file flight plan.”) That being said, I do think that when a law enforcement officer uses some sort of tenuous “probable cause” so that he can investigate a citizen for no more reason than because that person is riding a motorcycle it is not good police work. I am sure that it is not a wide spread behavior, but I am never comfortable when a person’s appearance is reason enough for law enforcement to deem it necessary to detain and question. That goes against my vision of the America I know and love.

Lastly, but definitely not the least, if you did not make it to Black Thursday you missed a great day. Kudos to Donnie “Mr. Breeze” from ABATE of WA and “Double D” from the Confederation of Clubs for all of the coordination work. Beautiful weather resulted in lots of riders actually being able to ride to the capitol. The north diagonal was filled to overflowing with motorcycles, and the halls were filled with well educated riders discussing their issues with their representatives. This is where the citizenship rubber meets the legislative road. If you sat at home and let everyone else do it you should be glad that the people who showed up did the heavy lifting.

If I have adequately shamed you, rest assured that there are still calls to be made and work to be done. It isn’t too late to lend a hand.

Like I say, if an old hippie from Texas can do it, how difficult can it be?

Ride Safe and Legislate Well

“Texas” Larry Walker
Governmental Relations Specialist
Washington Road Riders Association

The View From The Hill

Short sessions: they can be both trying and entertaining  When you toss in a projected budget shortfall, a short session can, and often does, approach chaos. Fortunately for the motorcycling community, most of our issues fall outside the main screen of the budgetary radar. The two exceptions are HB 2093 which looks at lowering the toll on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge and HB 2617 which eliminates a whole slew of boards and commissions.

HB 2617 has two sections in it that are detrimental to the motorcycling community. Section 151 eliminates the Motorcycle Safety Education Advisory Board, and section 157 eliminates the Nonhighway and Off-Road Vehicle Activities Advisory Committee. The intent of the Gubernatorial request bill is to shut down all of the out dated boards and commissions that take up staff time and resources that are funded through the General or Transportation funds. This is a definite case of governmental bean counting, done with a broad stroke of the brush, which even the Governor’s policy staff admitted that there may be some things that do not need to be included in these across the board cuts. It has been left up to the legislature to pare things down to the essential cuts and save the rest. That is the way things are done in this town; propose, counter propose, negotiate, and repeat as necessary. It may sound sloppy, but it actually does get things done.

I have spent most of my time this year meeting with members of the State Government and Tribal Affairs committee. That is the committee that has to deal with HB 2617 and all of the affected stake holders.

Here are the points that I have been pressing home to each member:

1. All operations of either board, no matter how slight, are fully funded by the stakeholder groups, with zero operating monies coming out of General or Transportation funds.

2. Both boards are fully supported by the stake holders.

3. Both boards facilitate a direct line of communication between the stake holders and the agency that oversees each program.

4. In a climate in which the average citizen feels disconnected from government, the abolishment of these two well functioning and effective boards sends the wrong message to people.

Riders are encouraged to contact their state legislators and ask that they speak to the members of the committee. Feel free to use the talking points that I have already used. They work whether you are a road rider or on off road enthusiast. It keeps the message focused and on track.

Rumor has it that the bill will be heard on Thursday January 21^st. I am absolutely certain that the bill will be amended before it ever clears the committee. Perhaps if we get enough buzz sections 151 and 157 will be removed in a proposed substitute prior to the bill being heard, so make the call.

The tolling bill, HB 2093 is a different sort of animal. The legislature is hesitant to direct the Washington State Transportation Commission on how they do their routine business. During the course of my conversations the general feeling is that we need to address our concerns to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge – Citizen Advisory Committee in lieu of seeking a legislative solution. I will hold my opinion at this point. I am merely reporting the news.

There are two bills in the works, SB 6345, with the companion bill HB 2635, which makes using a non hands free cell phone or texting while driving a primary offense. Imagine that, actually telling the multi-tasking cager to pay attention to the driving. Distracted driving is perhaps one of the most serious issues facing the motoring public as a whole. The executive board of the Washington Road Riders Association has already expressed their support for the spirit of this measure. This is not one of those “feel good” things that protects someone from themselves. This is a proposal to reach right into the wallet of the idiots who feel that they have much better things to do than pay attention while they are herding a 5,000 pound SUV across the nation’s highways.

ABATE of Washington is continuing to pursue helmet usage reform. (HB 1964) The current version includes language that would require either motorcycle safety training of mandatory medical coverage if a rider does not wish to wear a helmet. No matter your opinion, this is a moot point. Neither Representative Clibborn (House Transportation) nor Senator Haugen (Senate Transportation) will bring the bill up for a hearing, so the main reason for having a bill is to give context to the conversation about freedom of choice. In my own personal opinion, the call for medical insurance is unnecessary, as there is no real public burden involved that merits the governmental intrusion into the lives of the citizens.

The final bill that is getting buzz here in Olympia is HB 2511. This issue is being championed by the Confederation of Clubs, the US Defenders, and ABATE of Washington. It address profiling of people “using the fact that a person rides a motorcycle or wears motorcycle-related paraphernalia as a factor in deciding to stop and question, take enforcement action, arrest, or search a person or vehicle with or without legal basis under the United States Constitution or the Washington state Constitution.” That was quoting directly from the legislation. The WRRA is deferring the official conversation to the people who are actively championing this cause, as they are definitely the subject matter experts. (Normally, when I end up on the side of the road it more readily involves something akin to “failure to file flight plan.”)

Finally, don’t forget Black Thursday. Everyone needs to get themselves free and down to Olympia on January 21^st. There will be reserved parking for motorcycles and plenty of people to help you navigate the system. What will you say when your children ask “what did you do to protect the world of motorcycling?” Do you really want to say “I sat at home and let everyone else do it?”

After all, if an old hippie from Texas can do it, how difficult can it be?

Ride Safe and Legislate Well

“Texas ” Larry Walker

I am currently working on getting in with the committee chair which will consider the bill, along with the members of the committee.  I will get the talking points to everyone this evening, but riders are advised to get ready to call their legislators.

Texas Larry Walker
WRRA Government Relations.

Short legislative session current in full swing, we’ll cover any necessary items needing attention, hope to see you there.

Rolf Vitous

VP WWRA

We are moving into a new legislative session soon, we’ll discuss what we have info on right now.

Hope to see you there

Rolf Vitous

Contact: Jeff Hennie, MRF V.P. of Government Relations & Public Affairs

Washington DC Saturday, December 19, 2009 The US Senate passed a two month extension to the Highway bill in a rare Saturday Senate session. Just after the break of dawn, in the middle of one of Washington worst snow storms on record, the US senate passed a last minute extension of the Federal Highway programs. The House passed a similar measure earlier this week. The extension was needed because current programs expired on Friday December 18th, the extension will fund the programs through February 28th 2010. The measure will fund important road programs for the next two months, which is good; however these stop gap spending bills barely keep the highway projects and programs on life support. What we need is the full 6 year Highway Bill that Chairman Oberstar has written. However with the House and Senate and Obama administration spending tax dollars on everything but Transportation, that seems unlikely. President Obama had threatened to veto the spending bill due to some other, non transportation issues. The President is not expected to follow through on those threats. The legislation also contains some defense spending, and an extension to the Patriot Act. The MRF will keep you informed on this issue.