Senate Bill 89, which would have eliminated Colorado’s Motorcycle Operator Safety Training (MOST) program, died in committee Tuesday. But the senators who wish to give reform efforts a chance to succeed made it clear they will vote differently in the future if the program is not fixed.

The idea that the program has problems was not contested by anyone. The only discussion was on whether to kill the program outright or first let those involved with MOST do what they can to fix it. On a party line vote, the majority Democrats on the committee voted for the latter while the minority Republicans voted to kill the program.

In arguing for killing MOST, Sen. Scott Renfroe, the bill’s sponsor, challenged the need for such a program and said it was an area in which the government need not get involved. Sen. Renfroe made it clear he supports rider training, pointing out that he himself rides motorcycles, but that he feels the program has outlived its usefulness.

Opponents of the bill expressed concerns that killing MOST could result in the loss of an annual $100,000 grant for motorcycle safety efforts from the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. They also said that in talks with the Colorado Department of Revenue (DoR), DoR had made it clear that if MOST was killed, the department would no longer accept Beginning Rider Course certification in lieu of the department’s own testing of riders seeking to get licensed. Sen. Renfroe said he questioned whether DoR would in fact do that.

If DoR did do that, opponents pointed out, it would mean that the expense of testing, which is currently borne by the riders taking the courses, would fall on DoR, driving up government expenses.

Sen. Renfroe pointed to results of a survey conducted among riders who had taken the courses, saying that the riders themselves stated overwhelmingly that an increase in the price of the class would not have deterred them from taking them. Speaking for the Colorado Department of Transportation, which supported allowing time for the program to be fixed, Herman Stockinger pointed out that in fact, the survey showed that nearly 50 percent had said a $70 increase would indeed have caused them to reconsider. Seventy dollars per student is the amount that rider training is subsidized through MOST.

“That’s perhaps 4,000 plus people (per year) who wouldn’t have taken the training,” said Stockinger.

So MOST has a reprieve but it is not out of the woods. It is now up to those involved with MOST to put into effect the recommendations of a legislative audit report. And if those recommendations are not enacted, the next time this issue comes up the outcome could be very different.

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