Helmet bill is worst of alternatives

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The new version of the motorcycle helmet bill is the sort of thing that gives compromise a bad name. The Legislature should junk this emasculated piece of legislation before it's too late. In the compromise that led to first-round advancement of the bill sponsored by Sen. Adrian Smith of Gering, the bill was rewritten to make failure to wear a motorcycle helmet a secondary offense.

That means that police could not ticket a bareheaded motorcyclist unless the cyclist had committed some other moving traffic violation. Its provisions would be similar to Nebraska's seat belt law.

This ambiguity has a major drawback. It creates a loophole for evading the legal penalty for not wearing a helmet. It diminishes respect for law.

If the Legislature wants to repeal the law, it ought to have the spine to go ahead and do it rather than creating this goofy hybrid.

The arguments on motorcycle helmets have been aired often in recent years.

The evidence is overwhelming that motorcycle helmets save lives. In state after state the number of motorcycle fatalities dropped after passage of a helmet law. Every year trauma doctors, emergency room personnel and other medical workers line up to testify in favor of the helmet requirement.

A rider without a helmet is twice as likely to die in an accident and twice as likely to have a severe head injury, testified Dr. Joseph Stothert, trauma director at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. The average hospital bill at the center for a rider without a helmet was $45,947, he said. The average bill for riders with helmets was $19,438.

In addition the helmet law saves taxpayer dollars, since riders with severe head injuries sometimes end up in long-term care at taxpayer expense.

The main valid arguments advocates of repeal can present are that the requirement limits freedom of choice and that the state misses out on income from motorcyclists who select travel routes where they can ride bareheaded.

Repeal advocates bring up an interesting point when they draw attention to the lower motorcycle fatality rate in Iowa, which does not require helmets but does require training for motorcyclists.

But the choice is not between education and helmets.

A more sensible alternative would be to require both helmets and education. Presumably that would push the fatality and injury rate in Nebraska even lower.

It certainly would be a preferable alternative to the loophole compromise on the helmet law. But then almost anything would be.