About One Out Of 14 Washington Drivers Doesn’t Have A Valid License

On average, about one out of every 14 Washington drivers has a suspended or revoked license, state figures indicate.

And the number of people who go ahead and drive without a valid license is rising, state officials say.

“You’d be shocked if you knew how many people were out there driving without a license,” says Bellevue District Court Administrator Doug Mincher. “It’s more common than you could even imagine.”

Last year, nearly 2,600 people were tried in Bellevue for driving with a suspended license or no license at all. And that doesn’t count the many that never were caught. In Seattle, the number reached nearly 12,000.

Many people also drive without insurance, despite the $475 fine that infraction carries. Last year 2,608 people were caught driving without insurance in Bellevue.

State Sen. Pam Roach, R-Auburn, plans to introduce a bill in the next legislative session to allow police to impound vehicles of suspended drivers on the spot.

“By definition, if you’ve had your license suspended, there’s something wrong with your driving habits,” Roach says.

“A lot of suspended drivers are simply bad drivers,” Seattle City Attorney Mark Sidran said. “They’re drunk drivers who are still driving, they’re careless, they might have traffic infractions, so it’s a major safety issue.”

Sidran said a California traffic study found that a suspended driver is three times more likely to kill or severely injure someone than is a driver with a valid license.

“These people are irresponsible not only in the way they drive, but irresponsible generally,” he said.

“You have a lot of these people who may not worry about what might happen tomorrow, but they’re quite responsive when the tow truck pulls up. When you take someone’s car, you get their attention.”

Department of Licensing spokesman Mark Varadian said the state has about 4 million licensed drivers. As of the first of the year, there also were more than 288,000 drivers with suspended or revoked licenses.

Chris Jahrman, underwriting manager at Pemco Insurance, estimated that as many as 20 percent of all vehicles statewide are uninsured.

Varadian said the number of suspended or revoked licenses has steadily increased over the last four years by about 40,000 a year. That’s due in part, he said, to a state law that took effect in 1993, allowing a license to be suspended if someone fails to appear in court on a traffic violation.

Just before the law took effect, there were about 113,000 suspensions in the state. A year later, Varadian said, the number had climbed to 163,000.