Hawaii’s effort to lower the impaired driving limit is bolstered by a federal report

A new federal study on the effects of lowering the legal limit for impaired driving in Utah could provide a substantial push for legislative efforts in Hawaii to follow suit.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a public hearing Friday on Senate Bill 2096, which would drop the threshold for the crime of “operating a vehicle under the influence on an intoxicant” to a blood alcohol concentration of .05 grams per deciliter, down from the current standard of .08 g/dL.

If enacted, Hawaii would join Utah as the only two states to adopt a .05 BAC limit.

A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study published Friday shows that despite an increase in vehicle miles traveled, Utah’s fatal crash rate dropped by 19.8% in 2019, the first year under the lower legal limit, and the fatality rate decreased by 18.3%.

Additionally, more than 22% of those who drank alcohol indicated they changed their behavior once the law went into effect, according to the study, with the most common change being that they ensured “a sober ride” was available when drinking away from home.

The NHTSA study also found that arrests for alcohol-impaired driving did not spike after the law went into effect, as some expected, and that “alcohol sales and per capita consumption appeared to continue their increasing trends under the new law as did tourism and tax revenues,” countering economic arguments against lowering the limit.

Advocates for traffic safety in Hawaii are citing Utah’s experience as solid justification for tightening the state’s BAC standard.

“The bottom line is that the U.S. is one of the only countries that uses .08 as the threshold; almost every other country around the world uses .05 and Utah just a few years ago lowered its blood alcohol percentage from .08 to .05,” said bill proponent Sen. Chris Lee, (D, Hawaii Kai-­Waimanalo-Kailua). “And all of that is because every study shows .05 is the point at which motor function and the ability to drive a car begins to become impaired.”

Lt. William Hankins, traffic commander at the Maui Police Department, called the Utah law a “game changer” that will be key in getting other states to adopt the lower limit.

Hankins said 62% of Maui County’s 16 traffic fatalities last year involved a combination of alcohol and speeding.

“Plain and simple it’s going to save lives,” he said Wednesday. “If the state Legislature wants to save lives they’ll pass it. If they’re worried about money then they are not going to pass it and they’re going to listen to the liquor industry.”

Patrick McPherson, a defense attorney who handles impaired-driving cases, sees efforts to lower the BAC limit as “grandstanding” and said SB 2096 and similar measures are unpopular, unenforceable and destined to fail.

He has long advocated for “more palatable” legislation establishing a lesser violation for those caught with a BAC of .05 to .08, while maintaining stiffer penalties for “full DUIs” and repeat offenders. For example, he said, drivers caught at the lower range would be issued a citation and not allowed to drive home, and be subject to a fine, an alcohol assessment and other “education” and “behavior modification” requirements.

McPherson also urged lawmakers to consider comprehensive reform of Hawaii’s impaired driving laws instead of piecemeal proposals.

Testimony submitted for Friday’s hearing had not yet been posted on the Legislature’s website, but a measure proposed during the 2021 session to lower the legal limit for impaired driving received strong support from state and county prosecutors and law enforcement, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the National Safety Council and the Hawaii Alcohol Policy Alliance, among others.

Those opposed included some members of the alcohol and restaurant industry and the American Beverage Institute, which called the 2021 legislation “well intended but a poorly targeted approach to improve traffic safety in Hawaii.”

Testimony from the institute said its own analysis found that two-thirds of alcohol-related traffic fatalities in Hawaii involve someone with a BAC of 0.15 or above.

The industry group said the measure would adversely affect hospitality and restaurant businesses “already struggling to survive the lingering pandemic” and that making “criminals out of moderate and responsible consumers will make recovery even more challenging.”

The Honolulu Office of the Public Defender expressed similar concerns in its 2021 testimony, arguing that reducing the alcohol impairment level would burden already congested courts and “simply casts too wide a net and will result in criminalizing the behavior of normally responsible drinkers without having an impact on reducing alcohol related fatalities.”

Kurt Kendro, MADD’s public policy committee chair, said Wednesday there’s no such thing as a “responsible drinker” who drives, and that it’s time “for people to understand that any amount of alcohol is just not acceptable.”

“We are not prohibitionists. We want people to be responsible and not drive, because you can kill people and you can get hurt, and we all pay for it because of the millions of dollars resulting in impaired driving crashes,” said Kendro, a retired Honolulu Police Department major.

“In this day and age when you can get an Uber, Lyft, taxi or TheBus or you can call a friend, there is just not any good reason why you would want to drink and drive.”

An HPD spokeswoman said the agency also supports SB 2096 and companion House Bill 1437.

Last year, police generated 2,132 criminal cases for impaired driving on Oahu, down from 2,539 the previous year, according to the department. There were six fatal and four critical collisions on Oahu roadways that involved alcohol, compared to 17 fatal and seven critical alcohol-related crashes in 2020.

HPD also noted that 424 collisions islandwide in 2021 involved alcohol compared to 360 the previous year.

“If we want this tragic cycle to stop, then we as a society, we need to change the culture,” said acting Maj. James Slayter of HPD’s Traffic Division in a statement Wednesday to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “It can no longer be socially acceptable to ‘have a few’ or ‘smoke a little’ and still drive. Every time you take control of a vehicle while you are under the influence of an intoxicant, you risk your life and every other innocent life around you.”

Slayter, who will attend Friday’s legislative hearing, said that as a police officer, he has witnessed first-hand “the devastation” caused by impaired drivers who “thought” they were OK to drive or say they “can handle a few drinks.”

“Then when they crash or get caught, they blame it on a medication reaction, not eating enough food or some other excuse. But really, all they had to do is be responsible enough to pre-designate a sober driver or get a public form of transportation. Something so simple would save lives and wouldn’t require any changes to the law.”

After previous failed attempts to lower Hawaii’s BAC limit, Lee said he is hopeful SB 2096 will pass this year.

“I hope we’ve reached that point where there’s support for it, because it’s a demonstrated way in countries around the world and in other places to successfully save lives without any negative impacts … ,” he said. “And that’s really the end goal, how do you get people to stop driving drunk.”

The Senate Judiciary Committee also will hear testimony Friday on Senate Bill 2163, which would elevate negligent homicide in the first degree from a Class B felony to a Class A felony, punishable by 20 years in prison, under certain conditions.

The measure would apply to motorists who cause the death of another while operating a vehicle in a negligent manner and under the influence of an intoxicant if the person has one or more convictions for impaired driving within the previous 20 years, is driving with a suspended and revoked license due to impaired driving, or if they are “highly intoxicated.”

The committee hearing will begin at 9:30 a.m. Friday via videoconference and livestreamed on the Senate YouTube Channel.