In a Monday piece titled “Pendulum Swings on DWI Attitudes,” Albuquerque Journal columnist Leslie Linthicum covered a growing sentiment that New Mexico’s DWI penalties are going too far.

Linthicum found that 250 to 300 people under the legal limit are arrested annually for drunk driving in New Mexico and even people sleeping it off in their cars are going to jail for DWI.

Both MADD statewide Director LoraLee Ortiz and State DWI czar Rachel O’Connor admitted their awareness that this injustice is indeed happening.

It’s become such a problem that state Sen. Michael Sanchez, D-Belen, sponsored a bill to eliminate the alternative “impaired to the slightest degree” standard from the DWI statute. That is the statute that all 50 states have on the books that allows police to arrest people for DWI who were driving under the legal limit.

DWI czar O’Connor claims that the state is reviewing all of the elements of the state’s anti-DWI campaign to find out what has worked best and what has been most cost-effective. Arresting sober drivers for drunk driving probably won’t make the cut. And unless making MADD happy is among the criteria, we doubt that New Mexico’s law requiring ignition interlocks for all offenders will be on the short list. We recently explained why in a Journal guest column.
One solution to this growing problem that Linthicum offered is that legislators could “kick up the penalties only for multiple offenders.” As we’ve been saying for years, that is the best proposal for stopping hardcore drunk drivers.

Today, the Washington Post covered ABI’s involvement in the interlock debate:

The proposed laws face fierce opposition from the American Beverage Institute, a restaurant trade association that supports requiring the devices for repeat offenders and those judged to be heavy drinkers but argues that a judge should be free to decide for first-time offenders just over the legal limit.

Although the ABI opposes mandating interlocks for first-time offenders, Longwell said research supports the need to require their long-term use for “hard-core” repeat offenders and those caught well over the legal limit of 0.08 blood alcohol level.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said last year that studies suggest interlocks “may be necessary as a long-term or permanent condition of driving for repeat offenders.”

Longwell, who plans to testify this week at legislative hearings in Maryland and Virginia, said initial support for first-time offender bills tends to wane after lawmakers hear the other side of the argument.

“We’re going another notch down the slippery slope,” she said. “They are going to push until there is one installed in every car and it’s set on 0.00. It’s a backdoor approach to Prohibition that will shift the entire way we socialize.”

Installing the next generation of interlocks in all cars has been discussed by advocates in interviews.

Read the full article here.

Today’s Philadelphia Inquirer published an ABI letter to the editor about MADD’s campaign to see interlocks in all cars:

Your editorial (“Locked for safety,” Jan. 16) didn’t mention that mandating ignition interlocks for all drunken-driving offenders is an incremental step in a project that seeks to put alcohol sensors in all cars.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is trying to subtly encourage Americans to be supportive of such in-car alcohol sensors. But once in all cars, interlocks would be set well below the legal limit.

You will no longer be able to have a glass of wine with dinner, a beer at a ball game, or a champagne toast at a wedding before driving home. That application of the technology isn’t anti-drunks, it’s anti-drinks.

Sarah Longwell