Senate OKs Plan on Proof of Car Insurance : Bill Would Require Owners to Have Coverage When Registering Their Vehicle

The Senate on Friday approved and sent to the Assembly legislation requiring California motorists to provide proof of insurance when registering motor vehicles.

The bill, by Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Tarzana), went on a 27-4 vote to the Assembly, where Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) is pushing a more comprehensive automobile insurance proposal that contains a feature similar to Robbins’ legislation.

California motorists are already required to have auto insurance but usually are not asked to provide proof unless they are stopped for a traffic violation or are involved in an accident.

Help Lower Premiums

Robbins estimated that ultimately his legislation would result in 90% of the drivers in California carrying minimum auto insurance and would help lower premiums for uninsured motorist coverage.

But the bill drew fire from critics who argued that it would provide a false sense of security for insured drivers and asserted that low-income motorists who cannot afford insurance would keep on driving anyway.

Under a 1985 law, California drivers must carry proof of motor vehicle insurance and can be fined $250 for driving without minimum coverage. Even so, the number of uninsured vehicles is reportedly increasing and totals about 5 million, or 25% of all vehicles on the road.

The Robbins proposal, effective next July 1, would seek to put new teeth into the law by requiring that proof of insurance be provided before registration, renewal of registration or transfer of registration for any vehicle.

Another provision would empower police officers at random roadside checkpoints for drunk drivers to demand that any motorist stopped must show the proof of insurance. Officers at such checkpoints cannot now make such a demand.

The bill also calls for the Department of Motor Vehicles to check with insurance companies on a random basis to determine if motorists canceled their insurance policies after the vehicles were registered. Any driver who submitted false evidence of insurance would be punished by a maximum $5,000 fine, 30 days in jail and a one-year driver’s license suspension.

Robbins, chairman of the Senate Insurance Committee, estimated that half of the uninsured motorists would comply with the bill, but conceded under questioning that the remainder would not.

Sen. Ralph Dills (D-Gardena) said that low-income constituents in his Senate district “can’t afford to fix their clunkers, much less buy insurance. . . . They are going to drive anyway.”

But Robbins said that automobile insurance rates of motorists would be reduced by either stiff enforcement of the rate-cutting provisions of the Proposition 103 insurance initiative or by Speaker Brown’s bill, which proposes, among other things, making insurance more affordable to poor people.

Robbins said he would not seek Gov. George Deukmejian’s signature on his measure unless the Brown bill becomes law or rates are cut back under Proposition 103.

‘They Want Your Help’

Sen. Ed Davis (R-Valencia), a supporter, told the Senate that “the people of California are furious about people driving without insurance and massacring (other) people. They pay their insurance. They pay the registration fee. They want your help.”

But Sen. Larry Stirling (R-San Diego) noted that Robbins himself estimated that only about half of the uninsured drivers would comply with the bill and claimed that it would give “the public the sense that they are now protected” when uninsured motorists were still behind the wheel.