TUCSON (KGUN9-TV) - You'd better drop that cellphone and drive!
Today,Thursday, is the day -- Pima County's new law against texting and driving officially takes effect.
The Sheriff's Department will issue warnings for the next month. An actual ticket will cost you a hundred dollars, or 250 if you're texting and there's an accident.
It's a good bet that a lot of the drivers you see do not have their eyes, or their mind on the road. Instead they're sort of guiding a couple of tons of steel while their main interest is the phone in their hands.
Alice Schneider is one driver who think people text and drive..."Because they can get away with it. It's that, have it on the lap, or have it close by, or even have in in your steering wheel and I still see them do it. Usually I , if they're at a stop sign, I'll knock, wave to them and then show the phone and then go like that (she wags a finger) but a lot of them look like, oh yeah, right and take off."
Now that knock on the window could come from a Pima County Sheriff's Deputy. The texting ban County Supervisors officially passed last month is in effect now.
Sheriff Chris Nanos says, "We don't mandate that you get a ticket. We think that they will be reasonable in talking to people like they are with any traffic violation and sit down and explain to you that, hey, what you're doing is unsafe because you were weaving."
It's okay to text or email if you're at a dead stop. And it's okay to make a voice call if you're driving but anything else and you'll be risking a ticket.
Abby Stoner hopes the new law stops all those people who think they're the ones who can get away with texting and driving.
"Irresponsibility and unfortunately people pay the cost and I hope those people never have to have a loved one in a car accident or die because of someone, just a flip of a second looking at their phone instead of looking at the road in front of them."
