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House Transportation Committee concurs in SB 111 with amendment folding green-light limits into existing lamp statute
Summary
The House Transportation Committee unanimously concurred in Senate Bill 111 as amended, folding restrictions on flashing, rotating and continuous green lights into an existing statute on vehicle lamps and exempting certain manufacturer-installed indicators and authorized equipment.
The House Transportation Committee voted unanimously to concur in Senate Bill 111 as amended, deciding to fold limits on flashing, rotating and continuous green lights into an existing provision of state law governing vehicle lamps rather than creating a new, separate section.
Chair Durham opened executive action on the bill and Vice Chair Baum moved both to amend SB 111 and to concur in it as amended. Staff member Casey told the committee the amendment adds green-light language to the current statute that governs driving or moving a vehicle on a highway with certain types of lamps, aiming to avoid creating a fragmented new section of code. “The amendment is just trying to avoid adding extra code that’s already currently in place,” Casey said.
Committee discussion noted testimony that some vehicles are built with front-mounted green indicator lights (for example, battery-level indicators) that extinguish when the vehicle is in drive but can appear when the vehicle is in park. The amendment explicitly preserves allowances for those manufacturer-installed indicators while restricting the use of flashing, rotating or continuous green lights to specified equipment and authorized uses.
The committee adopted the amendment by voice vote; Vice Chair Baum announced several members voting aye by proxy (Representatives Cafaro, Fitzpatrick and Sullivan) and later recorded Representatives Cochran, Darling and Sprunger as voting aye by proxy. The committee then concurred in SB 111 as amended by voice vote; Chair Durham announced the concurrence was unanimous. Without objection, Representative Cochran will carry the bill on the House floor for second reading.
The action amends how the law treats green lights on public highways by consolidating lamp restrictions in the statute’s section on special restrictions on lamps and by specifying exceptions for authorized government equipment and manufacturer-installed indicators. The committee did not record a roll-call tally; the concurrence was taken by voice vote and proxies were announced.
