ABATE of Wisconsin was concerned about the number of motorcyclists injured by negligent motorists, and especially those injured by right of way violators.
There was an inequity in the amount of punishment these violators faced, even for causing serious bodily injury or death. A remedy to this situation was attained through the passage of ACT 466, a comprehensive motorcycle legislation victory for ABATE that became effective June 12, 2006.
Authored by then-Senator Dave Zien of Wisconsin, penalties for injuring a motorcyclist increased substantially including increased fines, mandatory traffic school, and automatic license suspension. Since passage of this legislation, it was learned that many traffic violations had their own definitions which excluded them from being included in the right of way violation sanctions, even though in essence they were right of way violations. For instance, going through a stop sign was considered a right of way violation. Running a red light is designated as ignoring a signal.
