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New CA Assembly Bill, AB 2276, Looks a Lot Like AB 1679, Now Has Co-sponsors, CAA Opposes by Ed Attanasio
When the insurance lobby can’t get a bill to gain traction, it rewrites it and tries again and again, hoping that some form of it will pass. The theory is that by plugging away, eventually the lobby will wear everyone down to the point where both sides of the aisle will agree enough to make it a law or regulation. Assembly Bill 2276 is the successor to Assembly Bill 1679, which was opposed by both the California Department of Insurance and California Autobody Association last
year. It’s identical to the bill that was introduced last year by Assemblywoman Autumn Burke, D-Inglewood. Unlike AB 1679, AB 2276 has co-sponsors. Assembly members Frank Bigelow, R-O’Neals; Phillip Chen, R-Diamond Bar; Kansen Chu, D-Milpitas; Tom Daly, DAnaheim; Timothy Grayson, DConcord; Chad Mays, R-Yucca Valley; Randy Voepel, R-Santee, have all joined Burke on the bill. The California Autobody Association, which in January examined problem spots in the draft-revised AB See AB 2276, Page 10
Fully Autonomous Cars Will be on California Roads by April Despite Fatal Crash in AZ California will allow fully autonomous cars without safety drivers to test on public roads for the first time. The state’s Department of Motor Vehicles announced the change Feb. 26, which outlines a permitting process for companies wishing to deploy driverless vehicles without anyone behind the wheel. The new rule will go into effect on April 2. This announcement occured before the Uber self-driver with a safety operator on board caused a fatal pedestrian collision. See adjacent story.
Robot cars have been allowed on the state’s public roads for testing since September 2014, but a safety driver behind the wheel has been required. A form of backup will still be mandatory, for a time. “Under these regulations, driverless cars being tested on public roads must have a remote operator monitoring the car, ready to take over as needed,” Recode reported Feb. 26. “That remote operator— who will be overseeing the car from a location outside of the car—must See Autonomous in CA, Page 68
AUTOBODYNEWS.COM
Vol. 36 / Issue 4 / April 2018
Non-OEM Parts Legal Battle, Begun in 1997, Set for Trial in May 2018
A federal judge in February declined in rejecting State Farm’s calls for to dismiss a $9 billion class action dismissal of the suit that whether or racketeering lawsuit against State not the Avery judgment should have Farm over the insurer’s alleged role been overturned, the vehicle owners in the election of an Illinois Supreme involved deserve to know they lost fairly. Court judge—setting the “Plaintiffs seek to vindistage for the latest trial in a cate their right to be judged decade-long battle involvby a tribunal that is unconting the insurer’s use of nonaminated by politics,” Judge OEM parts. Herndon wrote. The lawsuit claims The suit is seeking triple State Farm helped secure the damages of the Avery the 2004 election of Justice Lloyd Karmeier suit plus more than a dozen Lloyd Karmeier, and that Karmeier improperly participated in years of interest—a total of about $9 the reversal of a $1 billion judgment billion—for the 4.7 million vehicle against the insurer in 1999 in the owners represented in the original Avery vs. State Farm class action Avery suit. Trial is set to begin May 7. lawsuit. Without passing judgment on How did we get here? the merits of the current case, U.S. So how does a non-OEM parts lawDistrict Judge David Herndon said See Legal Battle, Page 48
Uber Halts Autonomous Car Testing After Pedestrian is Killed in AZ, First Known Fatality by Self Driver
ter: “Our hearts go out to the victim’s family. We are fully cooperating with A woman has died after being struck local authorities in their investigation by a self-driving Uber vehicle in of this incident.” It is believed that Elaine Tempe, Phoenix, AZ. The Volvo XC90 was operating Herzberg, 49, is the first pedestrian in autonomous mode when it hit the to be killed by an autonomous car. The incident occurred between Mill Avenue and Curry Road on the night of March 18. Police said the victim was crossing the road outside of a crosswalk at the time of the collision. The woman was taken to The autonomous Volvo XC90 struck a pedestrian as she the hospital, where she died crossed the road. Credit: ABC15 from her injuries. The National Transportation woman as she crossed the road, police said. A vehicle operator sat be- Safety Board said in a tweet that it is hind the wheel at the time of the “sending a team to investigate” the incident, but the car was carrying no incident. Uber had been testing its auother passengers. Uber said in a statement on TwitSee Uber Halts Car Testing, Page 22 by Alistair Charlton, GearBrain
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