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AJC.com > Legislature > Georgia Beat > Archives > 2005 > February > 18
Friday, February 18, 2005
Bill requires 16-year-olds to take driver’s ed for license
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Concerned parents and students joined state lawmakers Friday to announce a bill that would require teenagers to take driver’s education in order to get a license at age 16. Otherwise, teens would have to wait until age 17.
The bill, filed by Sen. Preston Smith (R-Rome), also would create a nine-member Georgia Driver’s Education Commission, which would have the power to accept both public and private donations to pay for driving simulators in every high school.
The legislation would tack a five percent surcharge onto any traffic violation in the state to help pay for the simulators.
“I firmly believe that Senate Bill 226 will save lives in Georgia and have a dramatic effect on the number of teen deaths,” Smith said.
If approved by the General Assembly, the bill would be called “Joshua’s Law” in honor of 17-year-old Joshua Brown, a Cartersville teen who died in July 2003 when he lost control of the car he was driving.
His parents, Alan and LuGina Brown, quickly realized that many other families had shared the grief of losing a child to inexperience behind the wheel. To honor their son’s memory, the Browns started a foundation to provide Cartersville High School students with simulator driving training.
Now, dozens of state lawmakers have signed on to Smith’s bill, hoping it will eventually lead to driving simulators in every Georgia high school.
Smith announced the bill on the main steps of the State Capitol, surrounded by 123 empty chairs draped with burgundy high school graduation robes. The empty robes represented the number of teen drivers in Georgia who died in 2003 as the result of an automobile accident.
The Browns said that Joshua wasn’t speeding, drinking or driving recklessly at the time of his accident.
“He simply did not know how to handle a vehicle under adverse conditions,” Alan Brown said. “No fault of his. I really believe that had this law been in place and had we been able to locate and find a simulator type school, or a driving type school, we could have saved Joshua’s life. And that’s a hard burden to bear.”
Smith said he hopes the General Assembly will approve the bill in the next few weeks, allowing it to go into effect on July 1. Already, 46 out of 56 Senators have signed on to the measure, and many members of the House have expressed support, Smith said. Rep. David Ralston (R-Blue Ridge) said he plans to introduce a companion bill in the House.
Driver’s education is not required in the state of Georgia to receive a license. In recent years, many Georgia high schools have scrapped their programs, blaming liability insurance costs and the expense of maintaining a fleet of cars.
Cartersville High student Gretchen Watts, 17, said she had to take driver’s ed at another high school nearly an hour away. The high school senior attended the press conference because she knew Joshua Brown and now works with the foundation that bears his name. Watts said that she excepts reaction among students to the bill to be mixed. Some kids will complain about having to take driver’s ed in order to be eligible for a license before age 17. Others she said, will think of the driving simulators as cool or a “fad.”
“I think it is an amazing idea,” Watts said. “The driving simulators will help give you the experience you need.”
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Gwinnett University Center bill could come up next week
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Legislation to create a four-year Gwinnett University Center won’t reach the floor of the Georgia House until at least the middle of next week.
The House Rules Committee had been asked to put the bill on next Tuesday’s House calendar. But House Speaker Pro Tem Mark Burkhalter (R-Alpharetta), who said he supports plans for the four-year school, said he has concerns about the financial impact on the state budget.
Rules Committee Chairman Earl Erhart (R-Powder Springs) said the bill will be reconsidered by the committee on Tuesday - meaning it could reach the House by Wednesday.
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House stalwart Nixon to undergo surgery today
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Members of the Georgia House prayed together today for Wiley T. Nixon, a fixture as familiar to Capitol insiders as the gold dome is to outsiders.
Nixon is hospitalized with heart problems, on a ventilator and facing surgery later today. For about 34 years, Nixon, the General Assembly’s postmaster, has worked his way into the hearts of state legislators and Capitol employees, seeing to it that the mail gets delivered and problems get solved.
Nixon, who is in his 60s is a short, chunky man from Carrollton who has had a hearing problem and a speech impediment since birth. In recent years, his arthritic legs and hips have been failing, so he travels around the hallways in a motorized scooter.
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