Number of Uninsured Drivers Nose-Dives

After a year in operation, a controversial state computer database appears to have dramatically reduced the number of uninsured motorists on Utah highways.

Slightly fewer than one in five motorists now are driving without state-required insurance coverage, down from more than one in four drivers in July 1995, according to statistics from Insure-Rite, a private contractor managing the database for the state.

That translates to about 240,000 uninsured drivers on the road today, nearly 110,000 fewer such motorists than 11 months ago -- a number roughly equivalent to the combined populations of St. George, Bountiful and Logan.

"No matter how we figure this, the trends show significant reductions," said Richard Kasteler, chief executive officer for Salt Lake City-based Insure-Rite.

The database compares state data on vehicle registrations and driver licenses with policy information provided each month by all Utah insurers. The system, the first of its kind nationally, is paid for with a $1 surcharge on all yearly vehicle registrations.

Kasteler said Insure-Rite expects to use only about 65% of the $1.4 million the surcharge raises each year, and will return the remainder to the state budget for other uses.

The state Department of Public Safety, which oversees the database, so far has used it to encourage compliance rather than threaten deadbeat drivers, sending letters asking residents whose records don't match to buy insurance if they don't have it.

"We're after a continued effort to get people to voluntarily jump on board with us," department spokesman Verdi White said. "If you give Utahns a good reason to do something, there's a majority who will just do it."

But police officers statewide also have access to the system's data, and are using it with increasing frequency to issue lack-of-insurance citations during traffic stops, White said.

According to Kasteler, the database still has an error rate of between 3% and 4%. Most of the goofs, he said, are due to different spellings on registration and insurance forms,recent car sales and vehicles being out of service.

Members of Utah's insurance industry fought bitterly two years ago to prevent the database from being created. They claimed it wouldn't work, was too expensive, invaded the privacy of policyholders, and that the problem of uninsured motorists was exaggerated.

And while they've backed away from some of those arguments, some still don't think the numbers are accurate.

Doug Sontag, a Utah-based lobbyist for the American Insurance Association, said Thursday the industry's own figures on claims filed for accidents involving uninsured motorists indicate the percentage of drivers lacking insurance is far lower than the database says.

"We can't figure it out," Sontag said.

Utah House Minority Whip Kelly Atkinson, a West Jordan Democrat and sponsor of a 1994 bill creating the database, said the insurance industry is wary that Utah's system eventually will force underwriters to cover a pool of high-risk motorists -- and lower premiums for legal drivers.

"I'm convinced that the insurance industry doesn't want to solve this problem," said Atkinson, who has resigned his House post to run in Utah's 2nd Congressional District. "Why would they want to insure these bad drivers when you and I are already paying for them?"

Sontag called the argument "a bunch of baloney."

"We'd love to see the system actually work," he said "We just don't know if it does."

6/7/96