Inside the long battle to ban cellphone use while driving
In Pennsylvania, texting while driving is a crime.
If an officer catches you drafting a message while in the driver’s seat, it will cost you a $50 fine, a summary offense violation and related court fees.
But browsing the internet, taking a photo or watching a video while behind the wheel?
The law does not cover those scenarios.
According to PennDOT, fatalities in distracted driving crashes reached a 10-year high of 80 deaths in 2022, the most recent year for which data was available.
“Over the years it is very evident that that [texting] law does not work, because it’s very difficult for law enforcement to enforce that law to know if someone’s actually texting,” said Sen. Rosemary Brown, R-Monroe.
The law could soon change, as a bill authored by Brown that is 12 years in the making could soon be up for the governor’s signature. Both the House and the Senate passed it this year — the Senate has to hold one more vote on it to approve amendments made by the House before it reaches Gov. Josh Shapiro’s desk. A spokesperson for Shapiro could not immediately be reached for comment, but Brown said he has previously indicated support for the bill.
Brown’s bill would make all forms of phone use while driving a primary offense subject to a $50 fine, plus court costs and other fees. Brown first introduced the bill when she was a state representative in 2012, and has introduced it multiple times since then.
‘My story is horrific’
It’s a change that Jacy Good, an anti-distracted driving advocate, has long pushed for, and feels well overdue.
Good’s decade of activism dates to the day she graduated from Muhlenberg College in May 2008. Halfway through the drive back to her home in Lancaster, a tractor-trailer hit Good and her parents’ car at an intersection.
The truck had swerved to avoid a teenager who made a left turn through a red light while talking on the phone.
Good’s parents were killed, and Good was severely injured. After a four-month stay in the hospital, Good survived but now lives with lingering complications like partial paralysis of her body and some cognitive issues.
“My story is horrific. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,” Good said in a phone interview. “I’d do anything to undo it, but that’s not a choice I get in life. But I hope whenever I share it, people can imagine, if they were me, what would their lives be like? If half their body didn’t work, or they lost the people they love the most, how would people fare if they were me?”
Less than a year after her crash, Good began speaking out publicly about distracted driving, appearing on the “Oprah Winfrey Show,” in a People Magazine article and dozens of other media outlets to share her story. She has long called for states to ban all types of phone use while driving.
All states surrounding Pennsylvania have already made cellphone use while driving a primary offense.
‘Worse and worse’
Brown said the bill has been a long process over a decade of amending and compromising on certain aspects of the bill, from changing the fines to mandating data collection.
“We’ve had different versions of the bill and have tried to satisfy a little bit of everything for everyone over the years,” Brown said. “With the changing legislators that serve for one term, two terms, then wouldn’t be there again, everything starts in the garbage and comes up again brand new. And I think we’ve seen this over the years too is just a tremendous amount of distracted driving and use of the cellphone when the driver’s behind the wheel, it’s just getting worse and worse. Crashes are getting worse and worse.”
Concerns from the legislative Black caucus about uneven enforcement
along racial lines led to a provision of the bill that would mandate the collection of race-based data during traffic stops.
That data, which all police departments in cities and towns with more than 5,000 people must collect, would then become public on an annual basis and evaluated for evidence of racial bias.
“How do we ensure the safety of the public and make sure that we are holding police accountable if we don’t have the data to show it?” state Rep. Donna Bullock, DPhiladelphia and a member of the Black caucus, said in 2021.
Evolution of the bill
Other concessions have also been made, including reducing the fine from between $300 and $500 to just $50 for a first-time offense. The bill also includes a 12-month period where drivers will receive only a warning instead of an offense.
Even still, it has received criticism from opponents including the Pennsylvania Freedom Caucus, a hard-right group of state legislators, whose members in a
news release wrote that the racial data collection would lead to discrimination “against those who appear to be Caucasian.”
Some House members who voted against it also made their case against it during the House floor vote: Rep. Doyle Heffley, RCarbon, said the bill would disadvantage people with older cars that do not have “hands-free” capabilities.
Advocates have shrugged off those concerns. No bill is perfect, but they hope that this one will do enough to curb distracted driving in Pennsylvania, they argue.
Changing behaviors
State Rep. Mike Schlossberg, D-Lehigh, was a classmate of Good’s at Muhlenberg and made addressing distracted driving one of his first priorities when he was elected in 2010 to Allentown City Council.
With the unanimous support of council, he authored a city ordinance that would fine drivers $150 to $300 for cellphone use while driving.
The ban was overturned a year later by Lehigh County Judge
James T. Anthony, who found the city did not have the jurisdiction on its own to outlaw hand-held device use within its borders.
Despite the ordinance’s being struck down, Schlossberg still saw it as a win.
“I remember that being a real defining moment for my career as an elected official, because laws are not just good for the sake of being laws, but because they can change behavior,” Schlossberg said.
He shared an anecdote from that time period.
He recalled visiting a local AT&T store to ask if they had any Bluetooth devices for sale, and was told by a store associate that they sold out after the city law passed. He saw that as evidence that the law had the power to incentivize better behavior, regardless of how it is eventually enforced.
Some research also backs up this conclusion: A study by the Ohio Department of Transportation found an 8.6% decrease in distracted driving since that state’s ban took effect late last year.
“I think this is a critical tool in the toolbox for law enforcement and cities to make sure our roads and streets are safe,” said state Rep. Josh Siegel, D-Lehigh, whose district includes most of Allentown.
Twelve years later, a hand-held ban is on the brink of becoming law in Pennsylvania.
o Good, despite some of the bill’s perceived shortcomings — like a relatively light fine — it’s still a victory.
But it needs to be properly enforced, too. Brown said the Shapiro administration would be responsible for educating local police departments on the law change, and the 12-month grace period would give both officers and drivers time to become acclimated to the new law.
“It seems they’ve done a very good job, it’s an enforceable law and when the law can be enforced, it’s been proven time and time again it can reduce crashes and deaths,” Good said.