OCR Text |
Show I UTAH AUTOMOBILES " I By THE THOUSANDS Secretary of State Says There Nearly Half of Families of Utah Using Them. H ruse plates have been issued bj Secretary of State Harden Bennlon ! '-this year for 34,750 automobiles in Ttah. While a few automobile own-j H f 1,- havo managed to escape the igil-, cnce, or to profit by the lack of vigil-j anco of peace officers and persons interested in the cause of good roads in the state, it is not believed at the' state capitol that there are more than ,35.000 automobiles in the state. The population of lTtah is estimated at 450,000 persons. At a average of! five persons to a family this viuld mean seven automobiles to eery eighteen eigh-teen families in the state. The average aver-age is one automobile to less than thir Jfccen persons in the state. The state obtained license plates for 1010 numbered up to 35.000 This was' not quite enough, and 116 plates of the 1 1916 series have been issued in the Inst two or three weeks, the officers j ueing notified that, when the numbers j bn the 1916 plates are higher than any number thru was issued, in the ear, i Biey are to regard them as 1919 plates, j Since new plates would be good j rnly until March 1, 1919, and since he wetather is rather cold for auto-j niobihng at present very few applica-J lions are being made now for new j license plates, and those ihat are be-1 ing made are largely on account of I transfers because of the sale of cars, I or to replace plates that have been lost The plates niay be issued and will be honored at any time after Jan Vtar 1, but all automobile owners will be liable to arrest if they drive cars after March 1 without having obtained ! he 1920 plates. i While the numbers on license plates ire theoretically 35.116. it is to be re-nembered re-nembered that between $00 and 1000 of these numbers are for transfers or I .o replace losl plates. The number of ears in the state actually carrying licenses, li-censes, therefore, would be reduced by that amount. On the other hand, j the numbers from 1 to 400 have been H reserved for automobile dealer.-', and dealers, plates have been issued, num-bered num-bered l rom 1 to 20$. Some dealers I hac obtained as high as thirty-five pairs of plates, but the average is H probably around five pairs, which would mean about lOOfi cars in the j h&nds of the dealers and beinu used H ui the roads for demonstration pur-I pur-I poses at any one time. The net number num-ber of ears being used on the roads of H ihe state, then ton with license plates, is about as given, 34,750, in HL round numbers. Complaints have come to the office, H of th' Becretarj of state frequent to the effect thai large numbers of' H- persons are evading the law govern-Hj govern-Hj nig license plates Forms ot evasion' Hi complained of are many. For example, It is reported that a man owns two! ears, one high-powered, and the other taking the minimum charge. He pur-' chases a pair of plates for the low ! powered car and uses them both on int car and on his high-powered car Estimates made as to the number; of cars not properly licensed have run j us high is 33 per cent of all the cars in the state. Mr. Bennion, however, H Relieves that this is entirely too high ' 'While I feel sure," he said, "that i there are still some persons in the j Ptate who have managed to evade the law with regard to licenses for auto-H auto-H mobiles, I do not feel that the number of such persons is very large "In the first place, every time there I has been a complaint as to part ir I ular person evading the law, the matter mat-ter has been checked up at once. It j is the duty of the peace officers to do this, and they have bcen prompt to respond. And let me say here that the police forces of Salt Lake City and Ogden have been particularlv efficient in the assistance they have rendered in enforcing observance of the law complaint that the law is being vlolat-! vlolat-! ed has been put up at once to the sheriff of the county in which the complaint originated and the matter has been followed up until some report re-port came from the officer showing that the alleged violation of the law had been investigated Frequently the report is accompained by fees for oevt license plates, or for transfers of plates, or for replacing lost plates ' I made a request of the legislature i for two special deputies to give their attention to this question of violation I of the law, and provided that a portion por-tion of the fines imposed should go to I repay these deputies for their vigilance. vigi-lance. The legislature, however, did not see the matter as 1 saw it, and amended It out of the measure "The officers have further been notified no-tified that a single plate on a car does not exempt the driver from ar resi Of course In such a case the officer of-ficer can use some judgment. But if I were in his place I should at least make the owner of the automobile show that he had acted in good faith and I believe that this is being done by the officers throughout the state. "It Is not very easy for a person to drive a car on the roads much before be-fore he is seen by someone who has enough interest in the cause of good roads to report it: if the car has no license li-cense plate. Automobile dealers themselves them-selves appreciate that they have an interest in this and they have promis ed me their hearty cooperation and I oeiievi tney are giving it. .t a? assembly as-sembly of dealers held early in the I year, I pointed out to them that the li-j li-j cense fees go into the motor vehicle fund, which is used for the building of good roads, and that good roads stimulate the sale of pledged themselves them-selves to assist in enforcing the law. I have recened valuable assistance from them "Moreover. I have traveled the Btate from the Idaho to the Arizona line, and from Gold Hill to Jensen, and I may say that I am sufficiently inter jested so that no car passes me that I do not notice its license plutcs. I j have checked up with many persons, 'but I can say that from all my observations ob-servations I do not believe that there 'is any greai amount of evasion of the law in this regard. i "I have observed a few 1916 platen I of late, because we are now issuing j those plates, since the supply of 1919 plates has run out. I have seen no 1017 plates 1 have found an occasional occasion-al 1918 plate, bill usually have found fl 1910 plate beside it on the car, the owner having simply failed to remove the 1919 plate. "We have had some trouble with regard to the distinction now drawn between passenger cars and those de-signed de-signed foi other service Particularly 'is this the case with cars that were originally passenger cars, but have been rebuilt with a body designed for express or freight service It the j truck license would be higher than the passenger license the tendency I foi the owner to list his car as still a passenger pas-senger car "On the whole, 1 thing we ma say that the majority of the people are jfair about it. Generally speaking they 'obey the law The realise thai after all, the money comes back to them in j better roads, and they are willing to l do their share in paying for this con istruction work There are really only a very few instances of continued violation of the law "Perhaps I might mention one instance in-stance which might have given rise to complaint from persons who did not quite understand, Dealers have come to me with the request that customers i from other states be permitted to j drive their cars out of the state and I not be put to the necessity of pur-1 rhasinjr a Utah license. I have al-. is nothing In the law Which enables me to issue any special permits I have however, suggested in such cases, that, if the dealer cares to, he may legitimately permit his plates to be used by the customer in driving the car out of the state, collecting, say. the $1 he has paid for the pair of plates. I believe that such a use of the plates would properly be viewed under the law as a demonstration of the new car. When the customer reaches his home he purchases a li cense in his own, state, and returns the pair of dealer's plates, the dealer refunding him the $4. My suggestion I has been followed, I know, in some in-j 'stances" Salt Lake Tribun- |