Fight on to stop uninsured drivers

It’s taken three years, but finally it appears a state task force is about ready to put together a proposal that would, if it works right, make it less likely we’ll be in an auto accident with someone without a dime’s worth of insurance.

That task force, cleverly if not economically, called the Electronic Motor Vehicle Financial Security Verification System Task Force, has been aiming at simply identifying cars on which there is no liability insurance.

With liability insurance, the other driver can pay medical bills if you’re injured and repair your car if it is damaged in an accident.

It means your insurer doesn’t have to come up with money to pay for damages caused by someone without insurance.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it. After all, you have to show proof of insurance to get a license tag for your car. No insurance, no license and you can’t drive a car without a license plate, of course.

But, because it’s possible to buy auto insurance a month at a time, some people just buy a month’s worth to get their tags, and then just stop paying their premiums. Some people don’t renew.

Figuring out who is insured and who isn’t is the problem.

Now, the “electronic” in that task force’s name might someday mean if your insurance isn’t in force, your car won’t start. That likely would be the best deal. But the task force is finding we probably are years away from that simple way to keep uninsured cars off the road.

For now, it’s concentrating on insurers reporting to the Kansas Insurance Department when their customers’ policies have been terminated.

And that means when law enforcement officers stop a car for any reason and ask for your license and registration they can return to their patrol cars, radio in some information and find out whether you have insurance.

No insurance and you don’t drive away. And that’s one less uninsured vehicle that might hit your car or my car.

Ideally, that means your insurance company doesn’t have to figure into your premiums the possibility it is going to have to pay for medical expenses or car repairs their customers didn’t cause.

It doesn’t get much better that than that.

But it’s becoming clear there are scores of little technical problems in the way.

Insurers have to report quickly when their coverage ends, and new insurers have to report when new coverage begins.

It’s got to be reported in a way that computers somewhere in the state have that information in a form that can be read at the county courthouse where license plates are issued and to police who need to know at a car stop whether the vehicle is insured.

Oh, then there’s not just keeping track of Kansas-licensed vehicles but vehicles from other states that venture into Kansas.

Will the task force get there?

Probably, but it’s not going to be simple and it’s not going to be quick.

It is something you’d ordinarily never hear about and someday, when the roads are covered with insured vehicles and uninsured vehicles are parked where they can’t do us any harm, we’ll wonder how it happened.

Well, it’s starting to happen now.

Martin Hawver is publisher of Hawver’s Capitol Report. To see about that, visit www.hawvernews. com or call (785) 267-5500.