SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Joe Martinez experienced a parent’s worst nightmare in 2013 when he was awoken by a phone call telling him his son Paul had been hit by a car and to get to the hospital.
Martinez jumped out of bed and raced to the hospital. When he arrived, he found a group of medics, police officers and family members gathered in the waiting room.
“I'm just like screaming, losing my mind, like what's going on, what's going on? Where's my son, where's Paul,” Martinez said. “And they said, 'Mr. Martinez, your son Paul has been brought here to the, ER. He's upstairs, he's been hit. We don't know how serious it is, but it doesn't look good.”
Martinez spent the next hour thinking about how this situation couldn’t be happening to him. Paul died one hour after being hit by a car and brought to the emergency room.
Now all Martinez, a single father, was left with was memories of his young son who he described as someone who loved art and living life to the fullest.
“[Paul] had dreams and goals just like every 21-year-old. No 21-year-old is thinking about death, and in fact, they're thinking about life and they're planning their future,” Martinez said.
Martinez got involved with the advocacy group Families for Safe Streets to help raise awareness of the dangers on the road. He now travels from his home in Fresno to Sacramento and the Bay Area to raise awareness about the dangers of speeding.
This year, he was a lead advocate for Senate Bill 961, which would require new vehicles in California to be equipped with warning systems that go off when traveling 10 mph over the speed limit.
Paul was hit by a car going 54 mph in a 40 mph zone. Martinez now hopes this proposed law will prevent other families from going through the same situation he went through a decade ago.
“Paul was thrown literally hundreds of feet is what I was told by law enforcement. Paul was struck so hard that it knocked him out of his shoes,” Martinez said.
According to the National Highway Transportation Authority, over 1,500 people were killed in speed-related traffic accidents in 2021. Speed-related crashes caused over one-third of all traffic fatalities that year.
Advocates like Martinez hope SB 961 will bring that number down as the technology will alert people when they are speeding. He believes it's a common sense measure to help protect people because “no family should experience my pain in order to have safe streets.”
The bill would require new cars and trucks sold in the state to be equipped with a speed monitor by 2030. It would exempt emergency vehicles, motorcycles, motorized scooters and other specialized vehicles from the requirement.
California would become the first state in the country to require the speed monitoring technology in cars. The European Union implemented similar regulations.
“This is not some type of new technology. This is established technology that is already in vehicles in this country and other parts of the world,” said the bill’s author, State Senator Scott Wiener.
Automotive groups opposed the bill as it went through the legislative process and are urging Governor Gavin Newsom to not to sign it into law.
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation (AAI) feels California is overstepping if it requires this technology as they believe it should be up to the federal government.
“We can’t have 50 states setting 50 competing sets of vehicle technology and safety rules…Automakers agree more can and must be done to reduce excessive speeding on roadways. This should include: more enforcement of speeding laws and driver education," the AAI said in a statement.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration started researching intelligent speed assistance technologies this year - specifically focusing on their capabilities and limitations, according to an NHTSA spokesperson.
California Republicans, like Assemblymember Tom Lackey, opposed SB 961. Lackey is a former California Highway Patrol officer who believes the added technology will have unintended consequences.
“All you’re going to hear now is a beep and a flash, and it’s going to be a distraction. It’s not going to change behavior,” Lackey said on the Assembly floor.
Meanwhile, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) supports the measure. Representatives from the agency testified in a Senate Transportation hearing for the bill.
“Implementing a passive ISA system is an important step that will help the public better understand the benefits of the technology as a driver assistance system and will allow manufacturers to fine-tune the technology for future active system implementation,” said NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy in a support letter.
For Martinez, enough people have suffered the pain of losing a loved one, and that is partly what led to him taking the big step of forgiving the driver who hit his son.
He decided the best way to honor Paul’s legacy was to display his artwork at art shows around Fresno. He decided to name the collection “Forgiveness” as a way to forgive the driver who hit and killed his son.
He now hopes Gov. Newsom will sign SB 961 into law. He has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto the bill into law.
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