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June 17, 2000

SECTION: TRANSPORTATION; Pg. 1916; Vol. 32, No. 25

LENGTH: 418 words

HEADLINE: Senate Hits the Road On Drunk Drivers, SUVs

BYLINE: David Hess

BODY:

The Senate Appropriations Committee on June 13 slid into
the driver's seat to set transportation policy-not just control
the purse strings-when it approved a giant highway-spending bill
that would crack down on intoxicated drivers and curb sport-
utility vehicles. The full Senate passed the legislation, 99-0,
on June 15.

The Senate's Transportation appropriations bill contains
about $ 54 billion in budget authority, including $ 13.4 billion in
discretionary accounts, for fiscal 2001. The bill includes about $1.6 billion less in discretionary money than the version the
House approved last month (H.R. 4475), thus setting the stage for
negotiations between the two chambers.

Policy fights will be fierce, especially on a provision
backed by Sens. Richard C. Shelby, R-Ala., and Frank Lautenberg,
D-N.J., that would require all states to adopt a 0.08 percent
blood alcohol standard for intoxicated drivers or face a partial
loss of federal highway funds. Nineteen states now have that
standard.

Interestingly, the strongest opposition to the plan in
committee came from Sens. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, and Robert
Bennett, R-Utah, whose home states have enacted the 0.08 percent
standard. Craig complained that setting such standards should be
"a state's prerogative and not be dictated by the federal
government." And Bennett argued that the withdrawal of federal
funds "should not be used as a coercive lever to force states" to
adhere to federal mandates.

The Appropriations Committee also agreed to direct the
National Academy of Sciences to conduct a nine-month study of the
alleged rollover tendencies of sport-utility vehicles. The bill
forbids the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to
issue any rollover safety rules for SUVs until such a study is
completed.

Meanwhile, the committee rejected the Clinton
Administration's bid to alter federal rules for long-distance
drivers of trucks and charter buses. Under law, drivers must rest
for eight hours between 10-hour drives. The Transportation
Department proposes to increase the rest period to 10 hours.

Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., pushed to instruct conferees
that fuel-efficiency standards should be tightened for the larger
vehicles that are now moving along the nation's highways. The
House has voted to bar any change in the so-called corporate
average fuel economy, or CAFE, standards.

LOAD-DATE: June 19, 2000

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