Before she spoke to the Montgomery County Council Tuesday, Mindy Badin placed a framed photograph of a young man on the witness table.
“This is a picture of my son Brett,” she said, explaining he was killed six years ago trying to cross a street in Montgomery County, Maryland.
“I know the pain of losing someone suddenly and violently on our roadways.” Badin said.
That’s one of the reasons Badin said she supports council legislation that would in Montgomery County.
“We’ve all seen on the news the doughnuts, the burnouts, the people hanging on to the outsides of vehicles,” she said.
The bill would expand the civil enforcement authority police have in trying to prevent and disband meetups that ended in one case with a damaged police cruiser in Chevy Chase.
Badin had a suggestion for lawmakers.
“I’d like to see the bill modified to include parking lots, parking structures, private property, where much of this unlawful racing and exhibition driving currently takes place,” she said
John Seng, who founded the Maryland Coalition for Roadway Safety, also referred to as Safe RoadsMD, told council members he also supports the bill.
“It will accomplish very little unless it’s enforced,” Seng said. “Effective enforcement requires a stronger, larger and better-equipped Montgomery County Police Department.”
Another bill supporter, Montgomery County resident Meredith McCain, said she lost a child in a car crash involving a negligent driver this year.
There seems to be little regard by many drivers for road safety, she said.
“I have people actually bypassing me on my very narrow little residential street, gunning their motors. I see motorcycles zooming by me,” McCain said.
She urged lawmakers to escalate the law enforcement and consequences of “disregarding normal driving rules and public safety.”
The bill, sponsored by council member Andrew Friedson, would bar racing, speed contests, exhibition, stunt driving and street takeovers on public roadways. It would also allow for the seizure of vehicles involved in the takeovers.
A council committee work session on the bill is scheduled for Oct. 5.
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