DENVER—The Colorado Senate passed a bill to toughen Colorado’s seat belt law on Thursday, sending it to the House.
The Senate voted 20-15 to back the measure (Senate Bill 296) with all Republicans and one Democrat, Sen. Morgan Carroll of Aurora, voting against it.
The bill would allow officers to pull over drivers who are suspected of not wearing seat belts and write them a $75 ticket, $10 more than the current fine.
Right now, seat belts are mandatory but authorities can only ticket people who have been pulled over for other traffic offenses and are then found not to be wearing one.
Republicans mostly objected to the federal government trying to impose its will on states by offering millions of dollars in transportation funds to those that pass such laws. But some shared Carroll’s concern that the change would give the police too much power to stop people. Carroll argued that officers may not be able to really tell if someone is wearing a seat belt until they pull them over.
“This opens the door to ‘Stop first and ask questions later,'” she said.
Backers face a bigger challenge in passing the bill in the House. The House killed the last two attempts to change the law, the last in 2007.
Whatever happens will happen quickly because lawmakers are set to wrap up their session by next Wednesday.
This is the last chance Colorado has to win up to $14 million in federal aid by changing its seat belt law because the federal program is set to expire this fall. How much the state gets depends on how many other states also squeeze in under the deadline.
Just before the Senate took its vote, bill sponsor Sen. Betty Boyd, D-Lakewood, told lawmakers that Florida had just passed a similar law, making it eligible for aid. Arkansas passed it last month.
