Traffic Safety Evaluation of California's Traffic Violator School Citation Dismissal Policy:Final rept

摘要

Courts in California may offer drivers cited for traffic violations the opportunity to attend a traffic violator school (TVS) in lieu of conviction. Those who return to the court with proof of course completion have their citations dismissed and masked from public inspection. Because there is no conviction of a violation, these TVS drivers do not have negligent-operator (neg-op) points added to their driving records by the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). The number of drivers attending TVS courses has been increasing. For example, in year 2005, approximately 1,233,327 drivers completed a TVS course as compared to 939,719 drivers completing a TVS course in 1996, an increase of 31%. TVS dismissals represent about 25% of the total number of traffic violation abstracts reported to the department by the courts.