Few Mixed Signals From This School

What better way for singles to meet in Los Angeles, the land where the official flower is the cloverleaf?

There are traffic schools for gourmets, for those who want to spend their obligatory eight hours being entertained. And now there is one specifically touted for those who are single.

“I’m a widow, and I wanted to meet people,” Hertha Dowling of Encino explained during a break at a class of the newly started L.A. Singles Traffic School. Like the other 12 women and the 19 men at this session, she had been offered a choice by a judge: Pay the fine, and, worse yet, probably see her next auto insurance premium soar, or attend one of the many area traffic schools.

$23 Fee and Penance

So on a sunny Saturday morning, enviously watching passers-by heading for a carefree day of boating at Marina del Rey, 32 traffic violators assembled in a banquet room of a restaurant to pay a $23 fee and do penance. Most of them had never seen each other before.

By the end of the day, not only had they enjoyed a lot of laughs together (“Why was I speeding? Because I was trying to find a restroom”), but phone numbers had also been exchanged and there was some pairing off during lunch.

Sheri Speer of Playa del Rey and John O’Shaughnessy of Santa Monica found themselves seated next to one another in class. When school co-founder and instructor Hardy Warren said he was a recent USC graduate, Speer and O’Shaughnessy commented to each other that they also had gone there.

Speer is a medical student at UCLA; O’Shaughnessy is assistant branch manager of a lighting maintenance company. Both said they are single; both decided to continue their conversation at a nearby restaurant.

“Actually, I was hoping to meet somebody,” the lighting man said on returning for the afternoon session.

Matching up, of course, wasn’t the purpose of spending the day thusly but as Karl Brodersen of Santa Monica put it: “I had to attend one of these another time and it was a drag.”

More Than 300 in State

The drill, according to Department of Motor Vehicles spokesperson Gina McGuiness, goes like this: “It is up to the court, but if you get a ticket for a moving violation, the judge may give you the option of attending a traffic school. Generally, this is allowed once every 12 months. You will be given a list of schools in your area licensed by the DMV, and it is up to you to make a choice. There now are more than 300 of them in the state.”

Although the name of the game is still eight hours of instruction on safe driving, sometimes divided into two nightly sessions, the approaches have been becoming more inventive.

Consider these:

- “The Lunch ‘n’ Learn School at Fine Area Restaurants,” which is San Diego-based, has about 50 class locations statewide. “One is aboard the Princess Louise in San Pedro,” said school owner Gwen Michael. “Wherever we have it, for $29, you get the class, the certificate and a quality lunch.”

- Cheap School. “Our fee is $15 to $17, and we use college students as teachers,” spokeswoman Ann Elkins said. “Everybody used to be on the lists in order of seniority, but when that was done away with, we changed our name to let people know we are low-priced.”

- The Guaranteed Not Boring Traffic School. “We use comedians, and the fee is $26,” receptionist Nancy Ramirez said. “If you find the class boring, you get your money back.”

Boring wasn’t the case in the Marina as the 21-year-old Warren and his audience wisecracked their way through the eight hours. When he asked what a yellow light means, one student shouted: “Go faster!”

Laughter filled the room as the instructor read off some of the excuses that have been given for running stop signs, such as: “It was a four-way stop, and I knew the other three drivers would.”

Not that the messages didn’t get through about traffic laws, defensive driving, use of seat belts, the effects of driving under the influence. “We have a contract with an outfit that sends out monitors who pop in on classes and report back to us,” DMV spokesperson McGuiness said.

Warren said during a break that he and fellow USC graduate Brett Elkins founded their school (which now offers classes from Orange County to Granada Hills) after reaching the conclusion that single drivers may not only want instruction together but also may have driving habits in common:

“For one thing, they probably are on the road more, probably tend not to stay at home much,” Warren said. “And they may be more vain than other motorists, which may mean such habits as putting on makeup or shaving while driving.”

When his class resumed, the students were divided into the speeders, illegal turners, stop sign runners and others. They competed for points while members took turns at the game Pictionary, which involves the guessing of something being drawn, such as a fire truck.

Although time didn’t permit it at this particular session, Warren said that sometimes, his traffic school for singles plays its version of “The Dating Game.” “One of the females will ask three males the same question--such as ‘If you were a car, what kind would you be and why?’--and she picks the answer that most attracts her.”

Rick Moon, a single from Downey, said during a break that he chose this school “because I thought it might be fun, and I might meet somebody.”

Whatever happened is his business, but he did, at any rate graduate--handed at the end of the day a teacher-signed certificate proving that he is indeed a road scholar. Such forms are returned by the driver to the court for credit.

Phone numbers aren’t.