CUYAHOGA COUNTY, Ohio — A bill being considered at the Ohio Statehouse could require teen drivers to wait longer to get their licenses.
H. B. 106 would require teenagers to wait a full 12 months after getting a learner’s permit, compared to the current six months, and would also change the times at which a licensed driver under 18 years old would need a parent or guardian in the car with them from midnight to 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.
Aaron Manis turns 16 years old on Thursday, April 25. On Monday, he finished his last of four lessons at Heights Driving School in Richmond Heights.
“I got my permit on October 25,” Manis said. “And since then I’ve been driving around a bit, like just around my town and all that. Did driver’s ed, finished that up in March.”
Manis said he was scheduled to take his road test on Saturday and hoped he’d pass.
“It’s exciting,” Manis said. “It’s like a kind of freedom from having to drive with my parents all over. I’ll get to drive by myself and go where I want.”
He did not think the bill that would require teens to wait a full 12 months would be a good idea, saying it would be tough on his parents.
“I play football and baseball and it’d be a lot easier just for me driving to my practices and not having them pick me up and drive me there,” Manis said.
Manis' mother, Lisa, said her oldest child has managed his time effectively to fit in 24 hours of classroom instruction, 50 hours of driving with her and her husband and another eight hours with a driving instructor, all in a six-month period. She said she thinks the proposed 12-month time period might make it easier for parents and children to fit in all that’s required to be eligible for a driver’s license.
“I think, if anything, it’s just giving parents more time and the kids more time to get things done,” Lisa Manis said. “It is a time crunch, six months, with kids involved in sports and activities and schoolwork. It’s a lot of time and effort.”
Daniel Cox, the CEO of Heights Driving School, said he thinks the bill does not take a couple of important issues into account.
First, he said, many teen drivers scramble to fit in all their requirements because they wait until the last minute, especially because they can now take their 24 hours of classroom instruction online.
“So extending it another six months, they’ll just wait until the end of that process, and we really want them on the road,” Cox said.
Cox said while teen drivers will likely always have a higher incidence of crashes than other age groups, and cell phone use doesn’t help, he believes the bottom line is that parents must get their children behind the wheel consistently to practice for the required 50 hours, of which 10 must be at night.
“I’m always for more experience with them,” Cox said. “Do I think [the bill] is going to have the outcome they really desire? I just don’t think it will. I hope it does, but I just don’t see that.”
The Ohio Department of Transportation said 15- to 19-year-olds represent five percent of Ohio drivers. However, crash statistics statewide show that from 2014 to 2016, those drivers were involved in 15 percent of crashes in Ohio. However, Matt Bruning, ODOT’s press secretary, said teen drivers were only at fault in some, not all, of those crashes.
The statistics from ODOT, broken down by county across Northeast Ohio:
