Bill to ban handheld phones while driving advances

Legislation that would ban handheld electronic devices while driving is advancing in the Pennsylvania General Assembly.

The House Transportation Committee on Tuesday voted 19-6 to approve a version of a Senate-passed bill that would combat distracted driving by making use of a cellphone or other interactive electronic device while driving a primary — or stoppable — offense.

“Since 2012, it’s been a primary offense to text while driving. This law has improved safety but is severely limited,” said committee Chairman Ed Neilson, D-Philadelphia. “Drivers are still permitted to use the exact same device while driving to make calls, watch movies, do all kinds of things, play on games ... This bill will fix that.”

If the bill is approved by the General Assembly and signed into law it would make Pennsylvania the 27th state to ban handheld devices while driving.

In 2022, there were 7,700 crashes involving drunk drivers in Pennsylvania, while that same year there were 11,400 crashes involving distracted drivers, Neilson said.

“This shows that distracted driving is now a greater safety problem than drunk driving in Pennsylvania,” he said.

The bill, sponsored by Sen. Rosemary Brown, R-Lackawanna County, passed the Senate in June by a bipartisan 37-11 vote.

Broadly speaking, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro is supportive of such a ban, according to administration officials.

The committee changed the Senate-passed bill to adjust the penalty to establish a $50 fine, plus costs, for any violation regardless of how many times a driver is stopped. The Senate bill increased the fines for a second and a third and subsequent offenses.

No points would be assigned to a driver’s record.

If enacted, this ban would not take effect for a year and for the first 12 months after that, police could only issue written warnings.

The committee also added a prohibition from allowing a driver to be charged with both using a handheld device and texting while driving if they are stopped. An

other provision it tacked on would bar law enforcement from seizing an electronic device unless otherwise provided for in the law.

‘Best we can do’

Brown, who has been working to get this legislation to the governor’s desk for nearly a decade, said she could accept those changes if it gets the public safety measure across the finish line.

“This legislation is the absolutely the best we can do with the current technology to try to prevent crashes and change behavior in a more positive way,” Brown said. “We have to try to really make sure you know you should be paying attention to the road.”

Rep. Kerry Benninghoff, R-Centre County, was among those who voted against the bill in committee. He said making the use of a handheld electronic device as a primary offense instead of one that would result from a traffic stop for a separate violation gives some of his fellow GOP lawmakers pause.

“Frankly I think with today’s technology, cars are going to the point where they will be hands-free but I do have also concerns for those who may be lower income, those who can’t afford vehicles that have this type of technology already in it, that they could subsequently disproportionately be … a greater risk of being pulled over,” Benninghoff said.

Another amendment the committee added also raised a concern for Benninghoff who saw it imposing an unfunded mandate on communities. That amendment would require state police and police departments in communities with more than 5,000 residents to collect profiling data during traffic stops.

The information that would be collected includes the reason for the stop; the perceived ethnicity, race, gender and age of the driver; whether a search of the vehicle was initiated, among other details. It would be compiled annually and made publicly available.