LANSING – A ban on text messaging while driving moved close to becoming law Tuesday as a primary offense, but some legislative hurdles remain before the measure goes to Governor Jennifer Granholm’s desk.

The House originally passed HB 4394 making texting while driving a secondary offense in December (94-13), meaning a police officer would have to pull someone over for another traffic violation to cite a person for also texting while driving.

In March, the Senate surprisingly changed that bill to a primary offense, putting into question whether the House could muster the votes to concur.

But the House did come up with a vote of 74-33 on Tuesday. The chamber also passed tie-barred legislation (HB 4370 , 101-6) allowing a person to be ticketed for the offense, but not have any points added to their license.

However, the chamber stopped short of passing the final tie-barred bill in the package (SB 468 ), which is similar to HB 4394. Once that bill is passed, the Senate will have to concur in any changes before it can be sent to the governor’s desk.

Rep. Alma Wheeler Smith (D-Salem Twp.) is readying an amendment to the Senate measure that would eliminate driver responsibility fees on misdemeanor offenses by replacing the money with fines from texting while driving.

Proponents of the texting ban praised the House vote, saying it will bring Michigan in line with more than 20 states that ban the practice.

Texting while driving is dangerous, said Rep. Lee Gonzales (D-Flint), the bill’s sponsor. The bills would ban communications on a two-way device, but still allow people to report accidents or other emergencies on their phone.

But Rep. Shanelle Jackson (D-Detroit) said while she supports the sentiment behind the bills, she believes making it a primary offense adds to the perception that Michigan is an easy state for racial profiling. She backed making texting while driving a secondary offense.

“We need to take a moment today to acknowledge profiling is a real issue,” she said.

Matt Bolger, legislative liaison for the Department of State Police, said they disagree that racial profiling among law enforcement truly is a problem in Michigan.

Asked about how police will enforce the ban should it take effect, Bolger said police will observe people’s driving habits as usual. He said people who are pulled over for the offense will have the choice of owning up to texting while driving and get no points added to their license or deal with a citation for careless driving, which adds four points.

The ban, which would fine people $100 for their first offense and $200 for any offense after that, would take effect July 1.

LAWMAKERS WHO SWITCHED THEIR VOTE TO ‘YES’: Bledsoe, DeShazor and Geiss.

LAWMALERS WHO SWITCHED THEIR VOTE TO ‘NO’: Bolger, Crawford, Daley, Denby, Elsenheimer, Gregory, Horn, Jackson, Johnson, Kowall, Leland, Moore, Nathan, Pavlov, Pearce, Rogers, R. Schmidt, Schuitmaker, B. Scott, Stanley and Young.

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