Imagine flauting the law like this ......
By Bob Young
Seattle Times staff reporter
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CHRIS JOSEPH TAYLOR / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Since July 1, using handheld cellphones while driving has been illegal. Observers say it's been largely ignored.
Cindy Baker-Williams held a "Hang Up and Drive" banner over Aurora Avenue North in Fremont when Washington's handheld cellphone ban for drivers began on the first of July.
She and her family hoped the new law would change drivers' behavior.
It did at first. "The initial trend we saw was less people talking," said Baker-Williams.
Then cellphone use started creeping back up, said Sgt. Freddy Williams of the State Patrol, who has carried on his own informal off-duty study of driving-and-talking.
He can't think of another law that's been flouted quite like this one. "I've seen people walk out of their house and before they put their car in gear, they're talking on the cellphone," he said.
Now, he says, "we see about one in three drivers talking on a cellphone. People seem to be ignoring the law."
Lawmakers, lawbreakers, law officers and advocates of the law agree on that.
It's not for complete lack of enforcement. Statewide, troopers handed out 746 tickets for illegal driving-and-talking through November. They've socked it to teenagers and septuagenarians; but mostly men and drivers in their 20s and 30s have paid the price. Troopers also issued 1,345 written and verbal warnings.
Seattle police have written another 247 tickets, according to the Seattle Municipal Court.
But driving-and-talking is a secondary offense, meaning the police have to stop a driver for another violation before they can write a $124 ticket for holding a cellphone.
And the number of driving-and-phoning citations is tiny compared to the 127,185 speeding tickets state troopers wrote between July and December.
"The motoring public has determined that Washington state troopers aren't going to be lurking around every corner just so they can write them cellphone tickets," Williams said.