In October, the legal blood alcohol limit for drunk driving stands to rise from 0.08 to 0.10, unless lawmakers vote today to make the lower level permanent.
Sgt. Matt Williams said it’s a formality under the provision to make sure 0.08 doesn’t go back up to 0.10.
“The research is very clear that 0.08 is a great standard. NHTSA, the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration, has conducted nearly 300 studies. They’ve all shown that at a 0.08 BAC level, virtually all drivers are impaired in the performance of critical driving tasks,” Williams said. “For example, like divided attention, complex reaction time, steering, lane-changing and judgment. They’re more than 10 times more likely to be involved in a fatal crash than the same driver at a 0.0 BAC.”
Michigan’s legal limit for drunk driving has been 0.08 since 2003, but only temporarily due to a “sunset” on the law, or a temporary extension.
