Florida seeks more driver transparency
Florida has introduced a new bill that would make it the 30th US state, along with the District of Columbia, to require a front license plate along with a rear plate. SB (Senate Bill) 92, backed by the Agriculture, Environment, and General Government Appropriations Committee, aims to lower Florida’s cases of unidentified cars from hit-and-runs. Out-of-state vehicles would be allowed to follow requirements for their home state. Florida Senator Joe Gruters highlighted how only 12.5% of Florida hit-and-run cases in 2023 resulted in charges, noting in a Fox interview: “As people are speeding away from these scenes, there’s a lot of cameras out there, and those cameras can’t always see the back of the plate. Sometimes, there are repeat offenders who know exactly how to get away from an accident without having their plates seen.”
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Another section of the bill would require Florida drivers to submit crash reports to auto body shops for estimated repairs worth $2,500 or more. This report must include a driver’s personal information, vehicle details, and a damage description. If drivers don’t submit a crash report, the auto body shop would be required to send their repair estimate to a Department of Law Enforcement database. Body shops that fail to forward the estimate could lose their registration. If passed, the bill would enact the Lilly Glaubach Act, named after a 13-year-old Tampa girl who was killed in a hit-and-run while riding her bike home from school. The front-and-back license plate requirement was added last week as an amendment to the bill.
Gruters noted that Florida drivers would pay a single registration fee, and the state would provide two plates, negating the need for another registration fee. Polk County, Florida, Sheriff Grady Judd is in favor of the bill’s body shop legislation but disagrees with the license plate requirement, labeling it as a burden for drivers to get another license plate and for police to enforce the law. “We have a lot of technology that we use to solve hit-and-runs, and if added front license plates were the end all, then I would be for it, but it’s simply not,” Grady said in an interview with Fox.
Florida is looking into another car-related bill
Agriculture, Environment, and General Government Appropriations Committee members voted unanimously in favor of the bill, which has to pass through one more committee before a full Senate vote. Pending approval, SB 92 will take effect July 1—but this isn’t the only Florida road law that could begin in July. A Florida legislature bill has proposed increasing the state’s maximum speed limit from 70 mph to 75 mph. Palm Beach Gardens driver Hunter Hopwood said that a speed limit change is worth looking into for speeding up traffic flow but clarified that the law’s effectiveness could be good or bad depending on the location and time of day, according to CBS.
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Final thoughts
While cost and safety concerns over a new front license plate requirement are valid, many drivers object to the practice since they feel it negatively alters their vehicle’s look. This perspective can be especially true for some car types, like Alfa Romeos and their Scudetto grille, which weren’t manufactured with front license plate placement in mind. For many years, Alfa Romeo had an off-center position for the front license plate, but the automaker decided to ditch this design in favor of centrally-mounted plates last year. It’ll be interesting to see how manufacturers and drivers against the mounting of a front license plate will react if this bill gets passed.
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