Iaquinto looks to get drunks off the road

A friend and I interrupted our early-morning power walk recently to wake up a guy taking a nap... behind the wheel.

He had stopped at a light and passed out, his foot on the brake and the motor still running. Cranky and stinking of alcohol, he clamored out of the vehicle and waved off questions about his sagging fender.

By then, a third bystander was having a lively phone conversation with a police dispatcher, so Sleepy folded himself back into the driver's seat and sped off, two police cars in pursuit.

For most people, a firsthand encounter with a drunken driver is far more terrifying.

It's no wonder there is little public sympathy for drunken drivers, and especially in Virginia, which has some of nation's toughest criminal penalties. Every year, legislators propose bills that would impose even more severe punishments. Most are rejected because jails are overcrowded, there's no money for more cells and it's simply impractical to lock up every drunken driver.

Del. Sal Iaquinto wants to tackle the problem differently. The Virginia Beach Republican introduced legislation this year that would require people convicted of driving while intoxicated to have an ignition interlock installed on their vehicles for six months.

It works like this: A driver blows into a tube that measures his or her blood-alcohol concentration. If it exceeds 0.02, the car won't start. To make sure the driver doesn't ask a friend to start the car, the gadget requires periodic retests.

"It doesn't stop people from working," Iaquinto said. "It doesn't stop them from having a social life.... It just stops them from driving drunk again."

Eight states mandate ignition interlocks for all DUIs. Virginia is one of 10 that order their use for repeat offenders or those with extremely high blood-alcohol levels. As of last month, 4,864 of the devices were in use, according to the Virginia Alcohol Safety Action Program.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving supports Iaquinto's bill. The group notes that of 194 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in Virginia in 2007, a quarter of the drivers had alcohol levels below the 0.15 now needed to trigger the existing law on ignition interlocks.

Del. Ken Melvin of Portsmouth says the costs are excessive for first-timers who may have made an innocent mistake. The $65 installation fee plus $65 monthly monitoring fees total $455 for six months, but the cost doubles if a driver owns two vehicles.

Chris Konschak, executive director of MADD Virginia, isn't sympathetic. "People are dying because of drivers with alcohol levels between .08 and .15, and the cost of those lives is not insignificant."

A more serious concern is that police and courts could become reluctant to arrest or convict drunken drivers as penalties grow more burdensome.

For me, the real test is the ability of ignition interlocks to take drunken drivers off the road. Researchers in New Mexico saw a 60 percent reduction in repeat offense rates compared to offenders who were not ordered to install the devices, though that percentage dropped significantly after they were removed.

"Puff and go" may not be the perfect solution, but ignition interlocks have almost certainly saved lives in Virginia already, and that's a success state leaders should be eager to build on.

Christina Nuckols is an editorial writer for The Virginian-Pilot. E-mail her at christina.nuckols@pilotonline.com.