Bikers Push for Relaxed Helmet Law

SACRAMENTO —  David Nunley is no easy rider; he’s a retired surgeon from Chico with a wife and three kids.

But when he hits the highway on his Harley-Davidson motorcycle, Nunley wants to feel the wind in his hair and hear the engine rumble--without the constraints of a helmet, as state law requires. And he hasn’t seen a single statistic to convince him that headgear makes riding any safer--certainly not one to justify the loss of personal freedom that he feels he has experienced.

“Anytime you have the state imposing a restriction on the citizens, there had better be a good reason for it,” says Nunley, 52. “This is completely bogus.”

Eleven years after California banned motorcyclists from the streets unless their skulls were safely secured, bikers such as Nunley are once again fighting in the state capital to reclaim what they see as their natural-born right to ride free.

Six similar efforts to relax or repeal the helmet law have failed amid strong opposition from trauma centers, police, insurance companies and others who say the mass head injuries suffered by helmetless riders are too deadly--and costly--to ignore.

But the latest measure by Assemblyman Dennis Mountjoy (R-Monrovia), which would let bikers ride without a helmet if they are 21 or older and have a $1-million insurance policy, has made it all the way to the Assembly floor, surprising many safety advocates.

“This is a matter of personal and individual rights,” Mountjoy said in an interview, calling the helmet law a classic example of “government nannyism.”

Nonetheless, the measure’s prospects in the Assembly, where it could be heard as early as today, remain uncertain. And it is expected to encounter a major roadblock in the upper house in the form of Senate President Pro Tempore John Burton (D-San Francisco), who has rallied lawmakers to kill similar legislation in the past.

Burton ridicules as “silly” the argument that government is infringing on riders’ freedom by forcing them to protect their heads. He says similar arguments have been made and refuted many times over, and are similar to the old opposition against mandatory vehicle seat belts, air bags and other safety measures now widely endorsed by the public.

To those who just can’t resist the temptation to ride uninhibited, Burton jokingly offers the following advice: “Let ‘em keep getting traffic tickets. It’s probably cheaper than $1 million in insurance anyway.”

The battle to pass a law requiring motorcyclists and their passengers to wear helmets was an epic affair that lasted decades. Initial efforts during the 1960s were snuffed out largely by the Hells Angels, who crowded the Capitol’s hearing rooms with tattooed bikers in full leather regalia. The leader of the motorcycle club, Ralph “Sonny” Barger, cornered legislators in hallways to apply coarse but highly effective lobbying techniques. Year after year, measures would surface and, year after year, they were beaten back by the bikers.

But the safety advocates and insurers finally won out in 1991, when Assemblyman Richard Floyd (D-Wilmington) put together enough votes to get the measure out of the Legislature and persuaded Gov. Pete Wilson to sign it. Motorcycle groups have been battling to overturn it ever since.

In one significant sense, the tide has turned their way. Part of the impetus for imposing a headgear requirement in California was a 1966 federal law that required states to pass mandatory helmet laws or lose transportation funding. That law was repealed in 1995, and states can now choose to repeal helmet laws without financial penalty. Currently, 20 states require helmets for all riders; 27 states have laws covering some riders, typically minors; and three states have no laws at all, according to a legislative analysis.

The days of outlaw bikers representing the cause are long over, however. The campaign to relax the law is now led by a national organization called American Brotherhood Aimed Toward Education which canvasses for candidates sympathetic to its cause and maintains a political action committee to dole out contributions. The campaign is also supported by the California Motorcycle Dealers Assn., which sees a link between the helmet law and sagging sales.

The bikers of today, the groups say, are painters, insurance salesmen, mechanics, lawyers--weekend warriors, for the most part, who see motorcycling as a hobby, not a way of life. And many consider helmets to be an unwanted government intrusion into their pastime.

“A lot of riders did not grow up wearing them, and they say it impedes their vision,” said motorcycle lobbyist Jim Lombardo, relating the argument that for some, helmets actually increase the dangers of riding.

Others, he concedes, have more superficial concerns.

“When they are cruising Newport Beach or Santa Cruz, they want the girls to see their face,” he said.

Mountjoy’s measure, AB 2700, nearly died in the Assembly Transportation Committee last month, but wound up passing by sheer happenstance. Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar), a supporter of relaxing the law, happened to be filling in for an absent lawmaker one day on the committee. Mountjoy asked for reconsideration of his measure, which had been defeated a week earlier, and Cardenas cast the deciding vote.

Safety groups were not amused. Allan Lind, Sacramento lobbyist for Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, has been disseminating a number of studies that have found a relationship between wearing a helmet and surviving a motorcycle wreck, and other studies showing that medical costs related to motorcycle injuries went down after the law took effect.

Opponents of a helmet law passionately dispute those studies, and say a highly touted motorcycle safety program, not the helmet law, is the reason for improved safety.

“Let’s be blunt about it: It is selfish vanity versus common sense,” Lind said, offering his take on the motorcyclists’ campaign. “They like the wind flowing through their hair, the rebels on the freeway. It’s a romantic notion, perhaps, but it is also a foolish one. What they are really saying here is that helmets are a fashion violation. I don’t see why the Legislature should override safety considerations for fashion.”