| What is Florida's safety belt
law? |
| Florida law is very
specific about how passengers in Florida should be belted. All front
seat occupants must be buckled up, regardless of age. Children ages 6-15
must be belted in either the front or back seat of the vehicle. The
driver is responsible for passengers under 16 years who are not buckled
up. Passengers 16 years of age or older may be individually fined if
they are not buckled up. |
| What is Florida's child safety
belt law? |
| All children under six
years must be properly restrained while riding in any car, pickup truck,
or van on Florida's roads, no matter where they are sitting in the
vehicle. Children through age three must be secured in a separate
carrier or a vehicle manufacturer's integrated child safety seat. For
children aged four through five years, a separate carrier, or integrated
child safety seat, or a safety belt may be used. |
| What is the fine for
not obeying Florida's safety belt and child safety belt laws? |
| The cost to a violator for
not wearing a safety belt in Florida is $30 plus any other legal
assessments up to an additional $30. The cost to a violator for not
following child safety belt laws is $60, plus any other legal
assessments up to an additional $30, and three points. |
| Why should Florida
citizens care if drivers and passengers refuse to buckle up? |
The fact is that all
Floridians pay the price for those who do not wear safety belts, through
higher health care and insurance costs. The costs of hospital care for
an unbuckled driver are 50 percent higher than those for a driver
wearing a safety belt. Florida citizens - not the individual - bear 85
percent of those costs. And these costs are further increased in Florida
with the added drivers on Florida roads due to tourism.
Businesses are paying the price as well. On-the-job
crashes cost employers $22,000 per crash and $110,000 per injury due to
lost productivity and higher insurance and medical costs. |
| Shouldn't it be a person's choice
to wear a seat belt? |
| Research shows that when a
driver is unbuckled, 70 percent of the time children in that vehicle
will not be buckled either. A child unrestrained in a 30-mile-per-hour
crash is equivalent to a child falling from a three-story building.
Personal choice is forfeited when others are injured and killed. |
| Don't law
enforcement officers have more important priorities than ticketing
Florida drivers for not wearing their seat belt? |
| Besides saving lives,
reducing injury and death, and saving taxpayers money, safety belt
enforcement often leads to the apprehension of felons. Florida's
statewide enforcement wave in May 1999, resulted in the apprehension of
263 fugitives, 376 other felony arrests, and 982 DUI arrests. |
| Do we really need to
make wearing a seat belt a primary (standard) offense in Florida? Isn't
a secondary law sufficient to enforce seat belt safety? |
| Even with Florida's
current secondary safety belt law, safety belt usage is only at 59
percent - well below the national average of 63 percent for
secondary-law states. Experience shows that upgrading to a primary
safety belt law can result in up to a 15 percent increase in safety belt
usage statewide. |
| Would tougher seat
belt laws and enforcement efforts really make a significant difference
to the citizens of Florida? |
| The National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration estimates that if Florida had a primary
enforcement safety belt law, 200 lives would be saved and 6,134 injuries
prevented the first year. This represents $385.1 million in potential
savings to taxpayers. |
