With no reliable standard, pot-impaired drivers a growing road hazard

Two years after legalizing pot, New York still has no standard or test for “driving while stoned.”

State Police Superintendent Steven Nigrelli conceded to state lawmakers at a Feb. 8 hearing that, despite his predecessor’s promises in 2021, “That device, that test, is still being worked on. It is not ready to be put into the field.”

This, when National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data suggest that up to half of US highway fatalities now involve cannabis.

Legalizing lawmakers opted to “solve” the issue by directing that state troopers and other law-enforcers be trained as “drug recognition experts,” but the training has lagged the rise in stoned drivers.

It doesn’t help that the Legislature opted to set the bar extra-high for penalizing stoned (vs. drunken) driving, creating a new “substantially impaired” standard for DUI-cannabis charges, while driving only “impaired” by pot is a simple traffic infraction.

We called out this mess two years ago, but neither the Legislature nor the executive branch has managed to make real headway.

Then again, Albany is right now struggling over how to address the explosion of illegal pot shops, with Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie citing concerns that lawmakers not “overreach.”

How about reaching in the first place?

At this rate, we wouldn’t bet on New York’s leaders to produce anything more than some “don’t toke and drive” ads to go along with the pathetic “buy legal” campaign.