Teen Driver Safety Guide

Video Transcript:
Cindy Speaker: Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death among teens in the United States, killing close to 6,000 every year. Teen death is the result of automobile accidents, exceed homicides and suicides. In Los Angeles, California, the law firm of Steinberg and Spencer is working hard to mitigate this frightening and escalating trend. The firm has recently published a three-guide for parents on Keeping Your Teen Drivers Safe.
Peter Steinberg, owner of the firm is our guest today and he is going to talk with us about this topic and this parent-teen driving contract and how he hopes it will empower parents to tackle these tough issues. So Peter, thank you for being with us today.

Peter Steinberg: Thank you Cindy, it’s always nice to be here.

Cindy Speaker: Well Peter, where do we dig in here to address this topic of teen driving as it relates to safety issues?

Peter Steinberg: Well Cindy, there’s some really good news here and that is that reportedly, 89% of teen say that their parents have the biggest influence on how they drive. So, that gives us as parents an opportunity to seek to educate ourselves as to how to educate and instruct our kids in regards to driver’s safety.

The fact is that the cause of most accidents can be attributed to plain old simple bad decisions and if we can help our teens to make good decisions instead of bad ones, we can prevent many accidents and save a lot of lives.

So right now, car crashes are the number one killer of teens in the United States and unfortunately, 11 teens die every day as a result of fatal injuries that occurred in an auto accident.

Cindy Speaker: Wow. Well Peter, where do we start?

Peter Steinberg: You know Cindy; I think the starting point today is our cellphones. Here are some facts that you’ll find in our teen driving safety guide:

Talking on a cellphone while driving slows a young driver’s reaction time to that of a 70-year old driver, and more than half of all teens report making and receiving phone calls while driving. I actually think that figure is probably a lot higher. But anyway, texting these days is a factor in 200,000 automobile crashes last year, and over a third of those were caused by a teen driver.

Cindy Speaker: These are really alarming statistics. So Peter, how do we talk to our teens about driver’s safety? How do we convince these young people that they’re not invincible and then help them grasp the way of the responsibility that goes along with driving a motor vehicle?

Peter Steinberg: Well Cindy, the best defense is to talk to your teenage driver—to really seriously talk to them.

Cindy Speaker: Well, can you give us some guidelines?

Peter Steinberg: Okay. Here are a few things. First of all, it’s really important to talk to your teenage driver in a really meaningful tone. The conversation is not lighthearted or comedy and it’s not disciplinary talk either. It needs to be very serious and it’d be helpful to give your teens some visual cues or visual aides. So it’s in our opinion, helpful to have a brochure on some safe driving tips or ideas.

We also have a summer newsletter with some information that could be used and that’s pretty relevant and we can also reference current events or celebrity car accident and not about parental experience that occurred 20 years ago, kind of in the “horse and buggy” era. I also think it’s very important to encourage your teenagers to ask questions. If you don’t have the answers, get them. And people are always welcome to call our office and if we could be of help, we’d be happy to do that.

Cindy Speaker: And Peter you said you have a free guide to offer, now what is in that?

Peter Steinberg: Well Cindy, in our guide you’ll find some of the statistics that I’ve just gone over and there’s a section that tells you how to talk to your teen. What do you say and what do you tell them? And the guide gives you plenty of specific guidelines to do that.

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We also have a section that talks about what we call the danger zones of teen driving. For instance, one of the biggest danger zones is that teens are inexperienced and it’s important to know what these zones are so that you can educate your teenagers and advocate what to do.

Another topic we have is the GDL law, this refers to Graduated Driver Licensing and it let’s new drivers get on road experience while driving gradually and under lowered risk conditions. Many parents we talked to don’t even know about this law and it’s in place to help you train your teen to be a good driver. So the final section of our guide is a contract that we have devised that encourages you to have your teens sign as a pledge to abide by the guidelines that the two of you agree on.

Cindy Speaker: You know, that’s a great idea Peter, and what’s included in this contract?

Peter Steinberg: Well Cindy, the format is bullet points to identify what their teenager will do and what he or she will not do. And then we have some ground rules covering items such as curfew time, passengers, weather conditions, how far they can travel, and we spell that out for the first four months of their driving, then the next four or five months, and then the remaining few months in a year. And there’s also a section that allows the parent to write a short narrative of the agreed upon consequences that will result if the contract is broken. And then both parties sign the contract and date the contract.

Cindy Speaker: Peter this sounds like a fantastic tool to help turn our teens into safer drivers. How can someone get that guide?

Peter Steinberg: Cindy, they can go to our website at www.steinbergspencer.com and you’ll see a link. Just put your name in it and email address and we’ll get that right out to you.

Cindy Speaker: Great, and if they want to reach you by phone, how can they do that Peter?

Peter Steinberg: They can call us nearly 24/7 at 1-800-350-8888.

Cindy Speaker: Peter this has been very valuable. Thank you so much for writing this guide and making it freely available to the public and thanks for being with me today.

Peter Steinberg: You’re quite welcome Cindy.

Cindy Speaker: This is Cindy Speaker for State Law TV.