HOUSE OP REPRESENTATIVES COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA ****** CONSUMER AFFAIRS COMMITTEE SENATE BILL 483 ****** Pages 1 through 237 Main Capitol Building Room 418 A-B Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Thursday, June 12, 1986 Met, pursuant to notice, at IOIOO a.m. COMMITTEE MEMBERS PRESENTi REPRESENTATIVE CHARLES LAUGHLIN, Chairman REPRESENTATIVE KEVIN BLAUM REPRESENTATIVE JEFFREY COY REPRESENTATIVE ALPHONSO DEAL REPRESENTATIVE TONY DeLUCA REPRESENTATIVE ROBERT FREEMAN REPRESENTATIVE ALLEN KUKOVICH REPRESENTATIVE PAUL McHALE REPRESENTATIVE JOSEPH STEIGHNER REPRESENTATIVE PETER WAMBACH REPRESENTATIVE ARTHUR HERSHEY REPRESENTATIVE TERRY PUNT i KEY REPORTERS 1854 HILTON AVENUE DOVER PENNSYLVANIA 17315 17171 764-0227- YORK (800) 233-9414 - PA 2 CONTENTS WITNESSES PAGE Jack Wagner, Councilman 5 City of Pittsburgh Howard Hughes, M.D., Past President 16 PA Chapter, American College of Emergency Physicians Robert Veit 66 Motor Vehicle Manufacturers of America William T. Reich 85 Buckle Up Pennsylvania Robert H. Mower 93 Alliance of American Insurers James Tuite 96 State Farm Insurance Company David Snyder 101 Nationwide Insurance Company William Titelman 123 PA Trial Lawyers' Association Brenda Shambaugh 134 PA State Grange Ellen Morris, Community Amputee Support Team 136 Bryn Mawr Rehabilitation Center Thomas Reed 140 Chairman, Bike PAC Charles Umbenhauer 142 ABATE, PA Frank Martin, President 146 PA Association of the National Head Injured Foundation Thomas Bryer, Director 148 Center for Highway Safety, PennDOT 3 CONTENTS (Continued) WITNESSES PAGE Dr. Robert Lease, Jr., Chairman 154 Traffic & Safety Department, Central York School District & Safety Coordinator, Millersville University, Continued Education Wayne Harper 160 York County Coroner's Office John Woodyear 166 Private Citizen Mark Schneider 168 Fraternal Association of Professional Paramedics, City of Pittsburgh Maureen Griffin 172 Survivor, Auto Accident Tom Morgan, Allentown Bureau of Health and 174 PA Public Health Association John Kavanagh 176 Allstate Insurance Company Carol Kehler, Director 180 Office of Legislative Programs, PA Department of Health Dorothy Hampson 183 Private Citizen Herberta Smith 188 Private Citizen Kay Gray 191 PA Emergency Nurses Association Nancy Demchak 194 Survivor, Auto Accident John Newman 200 Highway Users Federation Kenneth Bittner, Officer 204 Traffic Safety Director, Harrisburg Police Department 3-A CONTENTS (Continued) WITNESSES PAGE Captain William Hunter 208 Bureau of Patrol PA State Police Richard Morris 212 Bureau of Patrol Neil Jones 212 Center for Emergency Medicine for Western Pennsylvania Doug Jakim, Paramedic 215 McCandless-Franklin Park Ambulance Authority Stephen Gambescia 219 Consumer Health Education Association of the Delaware Valley Kay Yniguez 225 PA Congress of Parents & Teachers Robert Middleton 226 AAA Nicholas DeNunzio 233 Michael Benko 234 4 CHAIRMAN LAUGHLINs The meeting of the Consumer Affairs Committee on Senate Bill 483 and other legislative proposals dealing with seat belt, mandatory seat belt law in the State of Pennsylvania is called to order. ( Roll call was taken. ) CHAIRMAN LAUGHLINs For those who are here today and the number of members who are present from the Committee, the circumstance of a number of legislators in our Committee today is that they have other obligations throughout the State. For that purpose, we have secured the services of a person to take all testimony. There will be a book made up on it, and all members will receive your input, so be assured that the Committee members are concerned about your input. It is merely a case where they have obligations on other Committees where votes are being taken today. Today there will be no votes taken on this legislation. This is merely a public hearing for that purpose. The first gentleman to testify for today's hearing is Mr. Jack Wagner, Councilman from the City of Pittsburgh. I would say to all those who are testifying that if you have written remarks, present the written remarks and para­ phrase whenever you come to the table to speak. The reason I say that is there is a tremendous number of people who wish to have input, and I as Chairman do not wish to restrict you to any great degree? however, if it becomes a circumstance ____ of lengthy testimony, then we will have to do that; so, I would ask for your cooperation with regard to your testi­ mony. Councilman Wagner, welcome today to Harrisburg and to our meeting. You have the floor. MR. WAGNER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity of having this hearing here today and giving me and the other people here the opportunity to testify on Bill No. 483 which obviously I am here in support of Bill No. 483. CHAIRMAN LAUGHLINt We wouldn't have known that except for that badge you are wearing, Mr. Councilman. MR. WAGNER: I would like to tell you briefly a little bit about my responsibilities as a Councilman in the City of Pittsburgh. I am the Chairman of Public Safety Committee which includes responsibilities over the police, the fire, and the paramedics within the City and also general public safety issues that exist within the City of Pittsburgh. In addition to that, my past employment prior to being an elected official was in the safety profession. I have a Bachelor of Science Degree in Safety Management from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. I am a certified safety profes­ sional. I worked as a professional paramedic for two years. I mention all of this because I believe that my past work experience, my education, and ray present responsibilities 6__^ all relate to the bill in front of us here today. Bill No. 483. The reason for testifying is and I believe the reason for this bill is that we are losing the war in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in terms of saving lives on our road. Why? The majority reason I think is that the far majority of people within this Commonwealth are not wearing safety belts. Even though automobiles have had safety belts on them for almost twenty years going back to the late ' 60's where we had a mandatory law nationwide to have lap belts and also to have shoulder harnesses, we, in essence, have been unsuccessful in terms of convincing the public of the real need to wear those safety belts. We have spent millions upon millions of dollars, millions upon millions of hours have been devoted to educational programs, to media attention, to training in the schools, to all types of appeals to try and get the public to wear safety belts. In essence, we have been unsuccessful to a great degree. For that reason, I believe that there is a need for a mandatory law requiring people to wear safety belts. We all know the statistics that have come in front of us. I imagine we can talk about statistics all day, but we are absolutely certain that if a law of this type were passed within this Commonwealth, it would save 7 hundreds of lives right now in 1986. I look around the room here today, and I suspect we have close to a hundred people. We would save this year not only this many people but five times this many people, and they are reliable figures. They may be one of us. They may be one of our family. They may be one of our friends. They may not be anyone we know, but we know for sure that on a daily basis, people are dying on our roads and those injuries can be prevented with the use of safety belts. I came across an interesting statistic, and that statistic is that eighty-six percent of all people in this country believe that seat belts save lives, but the interesting item is eighty-six percent of the people are not wearing them. They're certainly not wearing them within Pennsylvania, and somehow someway we have to address that problem because if we continue to go the route we've been going trying to convince people to wear them, it's my fear that it's going to be years, possibly decades, pos­ sibly the turn of the century before we will ever convince the far majority of the public of the true need of safety belts, and still then I am not sure it can occur. For that reason, I believe we need to have legis­ lation. We need to require the public to move ahead in that direction. Many companies within the Commonwealth require their employees while at work to wear safety belts. 8 Within the last year, the City of Pittsburgh passed a regu­ lation within its Safety Committee to require all operators of vehicles while working within city government whether they be police, fire, refuse, public works, or whatever from the Mayor on down that they must wear seat belts when operating a city vehicle. We did that for a reason. Within the past five years, we have had several fatalities, several fatalities of city employees, two of which were fire fighters that fell out of fire trucks and lives could have been pre­ vented if we would have had a seat belt law. We sat down as a council. We sat down with the Mayor. We sat down with the various department heads and said the only route to travel is with a mandatory rule within city government. The problem is that we are only requiring those 5,200 to wear their seat belts while they are employed by the City. We need a law to assure that not only those people but the public within the City of Pittsburgh wears a seat belt all the time. I believe that the need to protect the public is the paramount issue here, and the public truly does not understand how important a safety seat belt law is. We have responded in many other ways I feel with the enactment of laws of which all of you have been part of such as the helmets for motorcycle operators.