Easley likely to veto big boats on roads

RALEIGH -- Gov. Mike Easley probably will veto legislation that would let fishermen and other recreational boaters haul wider boats on state roads — unless the bill is changed to ban towing at night, an aide told legislators today.

“The governor believes strongly that these wide boats at night are a safety hazard, that there would be additional deaths on the highway,” Franklin Freeman, a top adviser to Easley, told members of the House Finance Committee.

The General Assembly is considering several bills to relax limits on hauling wide boat trailers. The proposals would allow boaters to pull trailers up to 10 feet wide, day or night, without a permit.

Current law requires permits for boat trailers more than 8.5 feet wide and outlaws towing on Sundays, nights and holidays.

“Should it pass and get to the governor, the likelihood of his signing it is not good, given what he has indicated to me,” Freeman said.

The House Finance Committee voted 17-4 to strip the boat provision from a Senate-approved bill that would allow longer tractor-trailer trucks and some heavier farm trucks on state highways, and then approved the truck bill.

The committee modified the truck bill to make it easier for state transportation engineers to ban the longer 53-foot semi-trailers from roads too narrow to accommodate them safely.

Freeman said he would urge the Senate Finance Committee to amend a wide-boat bill that recently cleared the House, to remove night-time towing and add a zero-tolerance blood-alcohol provision for drivers who tow boat trailers.

He said boaters would benefit from the other provisions in the legislation, but they could lose everything if the legislature approves a bill that Easley refuses to sign, he said.

“If these [nighttime] provisions are stripped out, at least people get weekends, they get holidays, they get to haul wider boats without permits than they could before,” Freeman said. “At least they’ve got that. If the governor vetoes the bill and the veto is not overridden, they’ve got nothing.”

Rep. Jennifer Weiss of Cary echoed concerns expressed by the State Highway Patrol about the hazards of hauling 10-foot-wide boats at night on narrow roads with travel lanes less than 9.5 feet wide. She cited a review of regulations in 14 southeastern states.

“Every single one of them has statutes governing boats wider than 8.5 feet, and not one of them allows towing the boats at night,” Weiss said.