Stop DUI chief blasts Reid for vote on 0.08 measure

Wednesday, March 25, 1998 | 9:58 a.m.

A warm, decade-long relationship between Stop DUI Inc. and Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., came to an abrupt end earlier this month when Reid voted against a proposal that would set a national standard for drunk driving at a .08 percent blood-alcohol level.

"I'm more than hurt," Stop DUI Executive Director Sandy Heverly said. "When you have a history with a person such as Harry Reid you expect certain things. You expect a person to stand by their word."

Reid has been an outspoken supporter of the Stop DUI cause. Last year, as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, he helped secure $360,000 to assist enforcement of drunk driving laws in Nevada.

And Reid spokeswoman Jenny Backus said the senator recently supported a federal ban on open containers of alcohol in automobiles, consistent with Nevada law.

"Some say Nevada has some of the toughest drunk driving laws in the nation. Over 500 are now imprisoned for drunk driving," Backus said.

For the past four years, Reid has hosted a fund-raising event for Heverly's organization called "Fun Run,"raising more than $11,000, Backus said.

Heverly said she intends to return all of the money raised by Reid, beginn ing with a check for $2,000 last week.

The rift between Heverly and Reid occurred on March 4, when Reid and Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., voted against the anti-DUI bill, which passed by a vote of 62-32.

The bill, which will be voted on in the House of Representatives any day now, according to Backus, would penalize states that do not agree to lowering the blood-alcohol limit to .08 by withholding federal highway funds.

In voting against the bill, Reid said that although he personally favors the .08 standard, the Nevada Legislature on three occasions rejected it and he believes it is an issue of state's rights.

Heverly called the state's rights issue a "feeble scapegoat."

"Would he have voted against freeing the slaves and women's rights because they were state's rights issues?" Heverly asked.

Besides, she said, the state Legislature has never had the opportunity to vote on it because the issue has never come out of the Ways and Means Committee for a vote -- apparently because the issue is too hot.

Assemblyman Morse Arberry, D-Las Vegas, chairman of that committee, was unavailable for comment Tuesday.

Backus said she wished Heverly would have contacted Reid before holding a press conference and sending him an open letter that went to the media identifying only the senator as voting against the bill and ignoring the others opposing it.

She said she feels Heverly unfairly singled Reid out when Nevada's entire congressional delegation has voiced opposition to the .08 proposal.

Heverly said Reid was singled out because "the entire delegation did not stand before Congress and give a 10-minute address describing the carnage caused by drunk drivers and making a promise to America he would do everything he could do to stop it."

She said she was disappointed as well in Bryan for his vote and with the rest of the delegation for their positions, "but we have no history with them."

Heverly said she was deeply hurt by Reid's vote because "we viewed him not only as a legislator and leader, but also as a friend. That's what made the whole thing so devastating. And to add to it, he never indicated, never once indicated, he would oppose the measure."

Heverly said there are no political motives in her extreme disappointment in Reid's vote.

Reid is running for re-election this year.

"If the vote had been taken in 1996 or 1997, the end result would have been the same," she said.