Driving privilege cards working

An estimated 75 percent of the state's nearly 25,000 driving privilege card holders are insured, according to a new report by the Office of the Legislative Auditor General.

The audit was requested by Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, to determine whether driving privilege card holders were obtaining insurance. Last session, Bramble sponsored the bill that replaced driver's licenses of undocumented immigrants with driving privilege cards that can't be used as government identification.

A bill to repeal the driving privilege cards has been introduced in the House. Senate President John Valentine, R-Orem, said the report "gives a strong signal we should not repeal the driving privilege card, that it is working the way we thought it was going to work."

The report found 1,876 of a random sample of 2,500 driving privilege card holders had active insurance policies. That's compared to an 81 percent insurance rate for a random sample of 2,500 driver's license holders. The margin of error was 2 percent.

"The whole premise was to try to get insurance in to people who are driving in this state. You could not legally get insurance if you did not have the legal right to drive," Valentine said. "By having the driving privilege card, we've been able to obtain legal insurance for people who are driving on our roads who would not otherwise have insurance."

Rep. Glenn Donnelson, R-North Ogden, who is sponsoring HB64 to repeal driving privilege cards, declined to comment Thursday, saying he hadn't yet read the report. The repeal would cost the state roughly $473,400 in fees each year, according to the fiscal note.

The driving privilege cards brought hundreds of protesters to the Capitol, but were seen by an overwhelming majority of lawmakers as a compromise that allowed undocumented immigrants to drive legally without accessing citizenship rights such as purchasing firearms or voting.

During the debate on last year's bill, Bramble said concerns were raised that some people might not want a driving privilege card and so would not get insurance. He said the 25,000 cards issued since the end of March 2005 "is a fairly substantial number."

"This demonstrates at least in terms of the anticipation that someone getting a driving privilege card would be able to get insurance, the audit speaks for itself," Bramble said.

Bramble, who has said he'd sponsor the Senate version of HB64, said Thursday if the bill doing away with the driving privilege card is approved, "that would suggest the compromise has not worked."