Each week Editorial and Opinion Editor Jeanne Mariani-Belding hosts The Hot Seat, our opinion-page blog that brings in elected leaders and people in the news and lets you ask the questions during a live online chat.

On The Hot Seat last week was Carol McNamee, founder of Mothers Against Drunk Driving-Hawai'i. McNamee answered questions regarding an ignition interlock bill in the state Legislature.

Here is an excerpt from that Hot Seat session. To see the full conversation, go to The Hot Seat blog at www.honoluluadvertiser.com/opinion and click on "The Hot Seat." (Names of questioners are screen names given during our online chat.)

Kathy: Why do we need yet another new law and new way to try to keep people from drinking and driving? Haven't we in Hawai'i already done enough?

Carol McNamee: The main reason why people continue to drive drunk today, despite 26 years of intense public education and law enforcement's best efforts, is because they can! MADD-Hawai'i believes that the recent upward trend in alcohol-related fatalities in our state may indicate that although public education campaigns have reached and affected many citizens, they do not and cannot impact the "hard core" drinking driver.

To restart Hawai'i's positive trend, the next stage may not be education, but technology to actually prevent the act of driving drunk. Ignition interlock is the best of the currently available such technologies, and is already law in 46 states.

Puchi: How many people are arrested in Hawai'i each year for driving under the influence? As a small state, do we have enough business to expect companies to be interested in providing interlock services here?

McNamee: MADD has been assured by two or three companies that an interlock operation in Hawai'i would not be a problem. However, it is important that the law Hawai'i adopts not offer interlock as an option, but that it be mandatory. We must be able to give companies a clear estimate of how many drivers will be eligible for interlocks. We have approximately 6,000 arrests per year for DUI in Hawai'i statewide.

Jackie Jones: Who would be required to install an interlock device? Will it matter whether the person is arrested for the first time or has had other DUI offenses?

McNamee: The bill in the Legislature requires that all DUI offenders be required to install an interlock device. This means that first offenders, highly intoxicated offenders, and repeat offenders will all be required to install the device. We don't know yet about zero tolerance violators — those under the age of 21 who should not be driving with any measurable amount of alcohol.

Wave Rider: What makes you believe that interlock will work to stop people from driving drunk? What do you know about the history of how it's working in other states?

McNamee: The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism found that there is clear evidence that the ignition interlock device, installed in the offender's vehicle, is substantially more effective than license suspension in deterring DUI recidivism.

An International Council on Alcohol Drugs and Traffic Safety study concluded that "breath alcohol ignition interlock devices, when embedded in a comprehensive monitoring and service program lead to 40-95 percent reductions in the rate of repeat DWI offenses of convicted DWI offenders."

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration concluded that attaching an interlock to a car for a year after its operator is convicted of driving while intoxicated would reduce recidivism by an estimated 75 percent and alcohol-related fatalities by 7 percent.

At least 14 studies in the U.S. and Canada, from 1990 to 2002, show significant reductions in subsequent drunken driving offenses while the interlock device is installed. These studies show a reduction in recidivism rates from 50 to 95 percent.

New Mexico has seen a 28 percent decline in alcohol-related fatalities since passing its interlock law in 2005.

Phil: What exactly does the bill in our Legislature do regarding ignition interlock? If the bill passes, will we see interlocks on vehicles within the next year?

McNamee: Phil, HB 3377, SD2 requires installation of an ignition interlock device on the vehicle of a person arrested for driving under the influence. The device prevents the person from starting or operating a motor vehicle with more than a minimal alcohol concentration while their case is pending and while their license is revoked. It provides for certification of devices and vendors. Most importantly, it establishes a task force to prepare for implementation by figuring out the all-important mechanisms that allow the system to function.

The current bill provides a framework upon which the Task Force will build the parts that enable the whole idea to work. The bill goes into effect July 1 of this year but the effective date of the Interlock system itself is July 1, 2010.

John K: I'm not really familiar with the workings of the interlock system, but couldn't someone, like a passenger who was not drinking, breathe into the system and let the drunken driver drive? What is to prevent this from happening? I'm thinking about teenagers on a night out, or a spouse/partner.

McNamee: Currently interlocks are required to have anti-circumvention features that prevent such activity. One of these features is the running retest, which requires offenders to blow into the device at random intervals once the vehicle has been allowed to start.

A sound and a digital display will indicate to the driver when a retest is required. The interlock does not have the ability to stop the vehicle once it is running for safety reasons. When a driver fails a running retest, the vehicle's horn will honk and/or the lights will flash to alert law enforcement; the vehicle will not stop. A running retest discourages a driver from having a sober person start his vehicle and it deters the driver from drinking after he initially starts the car and begins driving.

Also, the newer devices come equipped with a small camera on the windshield that would take a photo of you — and you would be in trouble if your girlfriend blew into the device. Drivers also learn a special breath-and-hum code that is difficult to duplicate.

Patsy Kanahele Hicks: Is it fair for first offenders, who may have just made a one-time mistake after attending a wedding or some other celebration, to have to install an ignition interlock on their vehicles?

McNamee: Yes, even convicted offenders think so. A survey conducted in Albuquerque, N.M., indicated that 82 percent of offenders think that alcohol ignition interlocks are a fair DPI sanction for convicted offenders. Furthermore, research shows that people arrested for DUI have driven drunk an average of 87 times before being caught. This tells us that many first-time offenders may not really be offending for the first time; it's just the first time they were arrested.

Studies have shown that 70 to 80 percent of first offenders have a serious alcohol problem. They are not social drinkers who made a one-time mistake.

A first offender is at high risk for recommitting his crime. First offenders' patterns of recidivism are generally similar to that of a repeat offender. Dr. Richard Roth, an interlock expert in New Mexico, found that the reduction in recidivism is the same for first offenders as for repeat offenders — at least 60 percent.

Malia K: Won't people just drive someone else's car?

McNamee: This may happen. It is imperative that Hawai'i's law accommodate for this by mandating that all cars that the offender operates, not just owns, be equipped with an interlock.

Also, the data logger wired into the vehicle under the dashboard, keeps track of how often the vehicle is driven. If the record shows long periods with no attempted "starts" and no mileage or limited mileage, the offender may be charged with a new crime of circumventing the interlock system. These issues will be discussed by the Implementation Task Force for inclusion in the Hawai'i law.

Rolf Nordahl: I fear the root of the challenge is that our laws permit drinking and driving with an arbitrary percentage of alcohol in one's system. The drinker is then to judge whether he/she is fit to drive after drinking. Drinkers have impaired their judgment by drinking. How can they judge themselves fit to drive? Would you consider lobbying for zero tolerance? Driving after drinking alcohol (any amount) should be prohibited by law. The reduction in carnage would be dramatic. Isn't it time to stop kidding ourselves about this?

While I am not against drinking anymore than I am against driving; one should not do both on the same day.

McNamee: I agree that drinkers don't usually think they are drunk or know what their blood-alcohol level might be. That's why interlocks are so great. They are set usually at a .02 blood-alcohol concentration, which means the person should not have been drinking at all if he expects the car to start. The problem is that these devices are for people who already have a DUI. Some day technology will put a device in all cars manufactured.

Ruth: Will DUI offenders be given an option of installing an interlock device or having some other penalty like license suspension, community service or jail? If the offenders themselves don't make the choice, will the judge have the discretion to choose the penalty that could include interlock?

McNamee: It was the strong recommendation of the "Working Group" that deliberated last year and reported to the Legislature in December of 2007, that ignition interlock devices be required for all DUI offenders in Hawai'i. Experts who have studied DUI laws and interlock have realized that the only way the devices can be effective in reducing recidivism, crashes and fatalities is if they are put on as many of the vehicles of drunken drivers as possible. In states where the use of interlock is discretionary, not many devices are in use. Only 100,000 interlocks are being used countrywide at this time, meaning that states are losing out on an opportunity to save lives.

Pam: Is the use of ignition interlocks as a sanction for DUI constitutional?

McNamee: Pam, courts throughout the states have analyzed this issue and no state appellate court has overturned an interlock statute. Twenty states have alcohol ignition interlocks as part of mandatory sentencing for certain DUI offenses and none of these statutes has been challenged successfully.