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Va. driving fees won’t go away quickly
Richmond -
The constitutionality of Virginia’s abusive-drivers fees will be debated today in a General District Court outside Richmond, but don’t expect them to go away anytime soon. Even if Judge Archer Yeatts finds the fees violate constitutional maxims of equal protection, they still might not disappear because state prosecutors will almost certainly file an appeal to the Virginia Supreme Court. Kent Sinclair, a University of Virginia law professor, said the state’s high court usually takes at least a year to decide cases, but it could cut the wait in half if it heard arguments on an expedited schedule. The General Assembly, which meets again in January, could change the law before the legal process finishes if a lower court rules against the fees. Motorists’ best hope for seeing the fees eliminated appears to be the legislature because Sinclair said state and federal courts give bodies such as Congress and the General Assembly wide latitude in writing laws. “As long as there is a rational basis for what the General Assembly did, then the courts tend to leave the law alone even if it is something the court would not have done,” he said. Richmond lawyer Esther Windmueller will argue on behalf of a client facing a $900 penalty for driving on a suspended license that the fees are discriminatory because out-of-state drivers are not included. She was scheduled to represent the client Tuesday, but the case was postponed until Aug. 23 when he did not come to the courthouse. Windmueller said Wednesday afternoon that she was able to contact her client and agree with state prosecutors and Yeatts to a hearing this morning. The fees, which range from $750 to $3,000 and are paid over three years, have generated venomous public outrage since they took effect July 1. Many legislators who initially spoke in favor of the fees have reversed their stances in the past three weeks. “I have concluded that the abuser-fee bill is beyond repair,” said Del. Scott Lingamfelter, R-Prince William. |
