Monday May 19, 2008
Blog-o-Rama still remembers the first time the windshield was taken out on the drive to work. It was a couple days after an early winter snowstorm.
The sun was out and the Lexus SUV with the Greenwich dealer frame on the back was passing on the left as the parkway was turning into I-91. The sheet of ice flew up off the top of the luxury vehicle, cartwheeled a couple times and the Blogster ducked, watching it hit the windshield at 60 mph. There’s STILL glass in the car, two years later. It didn’t entirely take out the windshield, but it made for a white-knuckled final 20 minutes in the daily drive to work.
Scroll ahead a couple years later, when House Minority Leader Larry Cafero this year asked the legislative Transportation Committee to finally approve a bill to penalize vehicle owners who are too lazy to scrape the snow from the tops of their vehicles.
Well, during the “legislative process,” as they call it, the penalties pumped up so high that the bill conveniently collapsed from its own weight. Gov. Jodi Rell’s proposal was to fine drivers whose ice sheets cause damage. Another bill would have fined truck drivers thousands of dollars for letting snow accumulate.
That was the surviving bill, which was enough to put the fear of big fines in the mind of Mike Riley, the state trucking-industry lobbyist. He tried to assuage lawmakers by saying the home office in Washington is commissioning a study.
Anyway, the bill was subverted and commandeered in the waning days of the Legislature. But the title “An Act Concerning the Penalty for the Failure to Remove Snow and Ice From Vehicles” remained.
It came up for debate and final action in the House. Cafero, who’s seen it all before, had a little fun.
“Does this have absolutely anything to do with the removal of snow and ice from a motor vehicle?” Cafero asked Rep. Tony Guerrera, D-Rocky Hill, co-chairmasn of the Transportation Committee.
“Absolutely nothing,” Guerrera replied of the legislation, a 63-section piece of esoterica about the DMV.
“Someday we’re actually going to have a bill that actually has to do with the removal of snow and ice,” Cafero concluded.
Well, that was pretty optimistic.
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