BIKE: Helmet law was not repealed

[Michael Bluejay]

On Mar 12, 2005, at 2:02 PM, 
forum-bicycleaustin.info-request wrote:

> Ancient and elephantine listites will recall that this
> was the same Editorial Board that called Bill Spelman to the mat for
> repealing the short-lived but extraordinarily divisive, destructive, 
> and
> dangerous bicycle helmet law.


I hate to get picky, but the helmet law was not repealed, it was 
amended to apply only to chlidren (<18).  This is important to me for 
two reasons:

(1) It's still a problem that the law exists for kids, since the last 
time anyone checked, over 90% of the no-helmet tickets which went to 
kids, went to black and Hispanic kids.  I also ran a story a while back 
about a nine-year-old boy in Florida who was arrested and handcuffed 
for not wearing a helmet.  The responsibility for making sure kids wear 
helmets should lie with the parents, not the police.

(2) At he city council meeting where cyclists showed up in large 
numbers to press for a repeal (not an amendment), Councilmember Slusher 
tried to cut the proceedings short by telling the assembled crowd that 
we might want to waive our right to speak and just let the council 
vote, because they had enough votes for a repeal [not an amendment], 
and that the longer we talked the more likely that a councilmember 
might change their mind.  So we waived our right to speak, and then the 
council proceeded to vote on an AMENDMENT, not a repeal.

I was furious that Slusher, intentionally or not, misled the cyclists 
and talked them out of exercising their right to speak.  I wrote to him 
about it but I never got a reply.

	http://BicycleAustin.info/laws/helmet-laws.html

-MBJ-