The only things colder than Michigan in January are the heartless police officers who have been ticketing people for warming up cars in their own damn driveways. But now the Michigan House of Representatives is trying to put a stop to this nonsense, the Detroit Free Press reports. Thank god.
Earlier this year, some poor bastard from Roseville got slapped with a $128 ticket for leaving his car idling unattended in his own driveway. The guy, Nick Taylor, was just warming up his car since the day’s high was supposed to be a blisteringly-cold 19 degrees.
But a police officer wasn’t having it, so he slapped a ticket on the cowl anyway. Then, in April, Taylor tried challenging the citation, but a judge refused to back down.
But this nonsense may be on its way out, as the Detroit Free Press says that on May 2, the Michigan House of Representatives voted 77-30 to “repeal the portion of the Michigan Vehicle Code that allows law enforcement to ticket drivers who leave their car idling... on private property.”
State Rep. Holly Hughes—who sponsored the bill—told the newspaper this bill would keep in place the sections of the vehicle code dealing with private roads and parking lots, so don’t leave your car idling in front of Kroger.
She went on to tell news site MLive what prompted her to introduce the bill—to protect property rights:
I introduced this bill after a Michigan driver was issued a $128 ticket for leaving his car unattended in a driveway while warming his vehicle...People across our nation were rightfully outraged when they learned people could be ticketed for warming up their cars. An officer testified in committee that $128 is not a lot of money. I’m sorry, that is someone’s grocery or gas money.
HB 4215, as the bill is called, now goes on to the Senate. Hopefully it goes through, because we’ve all had enough of this garbage.