Texas Toughens Stance On Uninsured Motorists

Brooks Schuelke

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The Dallas Morning News posted a story yesterday describing Texas's new efforts to reduce the number of uninsured drivers. Under the plan, the state has created and will maintain a database of drivers and their insurance status. Whenever a person is pulled over, is involved in a wreck, gets a car inspection or registers for new license tags, the appropriate authority will check the database to make sure that the driver is insured. The state will also send reminders out to all uninsured drivers urging them to comply with the law.

Uninsured drivers are obviously a big problem, with approximately 25% of Texas's drivers not complying with the minimum insurance laws. But a segment of the population has been attempting to game the system. Those drivers will "purchase" insurance to obtain a proof of insurance card, and then cancel the insurance a few days later. Giving the appropriate authorities access to the database should prevent this type of manipulation of the system.

For more information on this subject, please refer to the section on Car and Motorcycle Accidents.