This month, my daughter Cari would have turned 54. We weren’t able to celebrate together, but I know the angels surely sang her Happy Birthday. I also want to believe that she was surrounded by friends and family who have passed on and joined her in Heaven. This belief helps to keep me sane.
Each time an anniversary, birthday or holiday comes around I like to reflect on the good that has come out of such a painful and devastating tragedy. It doesn't justify her death, but it gives me a sense of calm to know that hundreds of thousands of men, women and children have lived as the result of the action I somehow took after her death. I was not alone, thousands joined me in the war to stop drunk driving.
All of these hard-won battles may soon be for naught, at least in California. Governor Newsom is about to sign into law a bill that would basically give drunk drivers a license to kill. The bill AB 3234 will allow the record of impaired drivers to be erased if they completed a diversion and making any subsequent offense the first offense.
"Research tell us that one-third of all convicted DUI offenders will re-offend." The man who killed my daughter was a multiple repeat offender. California has come a long way since my days as an activist in my home state, and today’s news isn’t good.
"According to the most recent data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System, California is above the national average for impaired driving fatalities. In California, DUI fatalities have increased 8% over the past 10 years as national DUI deaths fell 8%.
California’s DUI deaths are moving in the wrong direction, and driving impaired by multiple substances is an ever-increasing problem with a high crash risk." (Responsibility.org)
While I continue to mourn my daughter’s death, and send flowers to her grave, the California legislature and the Governor have chosen to head backwards and worsen California's trend of DUI fatalities by giving drunk drivers a free pass.
We Save Lives joined Responsibilty.org., The National Safety Council, RADD, Recording Artists Against Drunk Driving, DISCUS, Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, The National Coalition for Safe Roads, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police in
urging Governor Newsom to Veto this bill.
I am urging you to do the same.
His contact info:
The Honorable Gavin Newsom
Governor
State of California
1303 10th Street, Suite 1173
Sacramento, CA 95814
Phone: (916) 445-2841
Fax: (916) 558-3160
Call his office, send him a letter, tweet him a message but you need to do it quickly. You can stop this bill from becoming law. Make your voice count!
Because we care . . .
