Premium Channel : Driving: State senators get an earful from viewers who call in during televised hearing on ‘pay at the pump’ insurance proposal.

A “pay at the pump” no-fault auto insurance proposal took a unique test drive Wednesday through California as residents spoke directly with lawmakers during a televised Senate hearing.

The unusual give-and-take occurred when the Senate Insurance Committee, chaired by Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles), broadcast its fact-finding hearing on cable television and took viewer comments from those calling 1-800-SPEAK OUT.

A Torres aide said the committee switchboard was jammed with calls and “unfortunately a lot of people did not get through.” A total of 17 did, with mixed results for elevating the level of dialogue in the state Capitol:

* A Sunnyvale woman seized the opportunity to skip lightly over the insurance issue and instead accused politicians in Sacramento of “doing nothing but gouging your way into my pocket.” Without waiting for a response, she banged down the telephone.

* A San Diego truck driver, noting his four teen-age children and four vehicles, said he now pays $3,000 a year in insurance premiums “and I don’t squabble about it a bit.” He was concerned that a pay-at-the-pump system would end up in the hands of inefficient government bureaucrats, a worry also voiced by a Sacramento-area retiree who said he was convinced the insurance overhaul “absolutely won’t work.”

* A Los Angeles man supported the plan to pay for insurance coverage when buying gasoline and predicted it would encourage the development of alternative energy that does not depend on oil. To Torres’ delight, he called the Legislature’s first venture into interactive television a “great idea.”

The program was broadcast by the nonprofit California Channel, which has spotty availability among cable television systems in the state. The largest cable system in Los Angeles, Continental, does not carry the California Channel.

Torres, who has said he may run next year for insurance commissioner if incumbent John Garamendi does not seek reelection, indicated that more televised hearings with toll-free lines probably will be held on other issues.

He said he selected automobile insurance for the first such hearing because Californians are angry about high rates and the legislative paralysis that has blocked reform for at least 30 years.

Under “pay at the pump,” a motorist would automatically be covered by a basic, no-fault automobile insurance financed by an estimated extra charge of 40 cents a gallon of gasoline. The state government would collect the funds and private insurance companies would bid to provide the coverage.

All motorists would be automatically covered for unlimited medical expenses and loss of wages up to $25,000 a year. The plan would eliminate the need for uninsured motorist coverage, since everyone would be covered. It also would bar personal injury lawsuits to recover damages for pain and suffering.

The proposal has been outlined by writer Andrew Tobias in the new book “Auto Insurance Alert” and would replace the current $12-billion system. In many areas of California, notably in Los Angeles, insurance premiums are too expensive for many drivers, who go without insurance.

Garamendi has estimated that no-fault insurance at the pump would save California drivers $4 billion a year in insurance costs, a figure challenged by representatives of the insurance industry and others at the hearing.

Although no formal bill was before the Senate committee, Torres called the hearing to examine the concept and said he may introduce legislation later that likely would be subject to voter ratification of the plan.

In his book, Tobias concedes that while his proposal would save motorists money on their insurance, it also would require phased-in implementation because of its complexity. For example, his plan would not cover the travel of California drivers in other states without a comparable pay-pump system. This would avoid the temptation to commit fraud by registering a car in California for insurance purposes, but driving it heavily outside the state.

For out-of-state trips, he said, Californians could easily purchase private daily or weekly travel policies such as those available at airports.

For visiting motorists, Tobias said they could be either socked at the pump but get no coverage or they could be fully covered, even though they had paid no surcharges on registration, driver licenses or traffic tickets, as California residents would under the pay-at-the-pump plan.

Another option noted by Garamendi at Wednesday’s hearing is having tourists turn in their gasoline receipts for a state rebate.

At least until neighboring states adopted a compatible plan, Tobias acknowledged his proposal would deal an economic blow to gasoline stations located near the borders of Nevada, Arizona and Oregon. He conceded travelers probably would bypass them and buy less expensive fuel in the other states.

While the current proposal seems to have stirred citizen interest, it contains some of the same elements of a rejected pay-at-the-pump bill introduced in 1975, which contained a 6% sales tax increase on gasoline. “Nobody liked the idea except the authors,” recalled former Sen. Alan Sieroty (D-Los Angeles), a co-author.