Millions of recalled vehicles unrepaired yearly
Although many owners neglect repairs, safety experts say
the system used to track recalled vehicles is insufficient
BY DEE-ANN DURBIN
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Timothy
Michaud died in May after falling
from the tailgate of a Chevrolet pick
up and suffering severe head injuries.
The 19-year-old from Maine never
knew that General Motors Corp. had
recalled the pickup two months ear
lier because the tailgate cables could
corrode and snap. At the time of the
accident, Michaud’s employer —
who owned the used 2000 pickup —
hadn’t received a recall notice, said
Stephen Schwarz, an attorney for the
Michaud family.
The pickup was one of the millions
of recalled vehicles that go unrepaired
each year. Sometimes, vehicle owners
are at fault for not getting repairs. But
some safety experts say automakers
and federal regulators share the blame
because they haven’t developed a bet
ter system to track whether a vehicle
has in fact been repaired.
“California requires that whenever
you go in for registration, they check
what emissions recalls have been
done,” said Clarence Ditlow of the
Center for Auto Safety, an advocacy
group. “If you can do it for emissions
recalls, you can do it for safety recalls.”
Kathy DeMeter, director of defect
investigations for the National High
way Traffic Safety Administration,
said around 72 percent of recalled ve
hicles are repaired each year. That
means that in 2003, when 19.1 mil
lion vehicles were recalled, about 5.3
million vehicles weren’t repaired.
While the repair rate is lower than
the NHTSA would like, DeMeter said
it’s up from a decade ago, when the
average was 65 percent. She also said
it is higher than other auto-related
products. Only 35 percent of recalled
tires and 45 percent of recalled child
seats are repaired because it is harder
to track the owners.
“People are becoming more
aware of safety, and manufacturers
are doing a better job of notifying
them,” DeMeter said.
Automakers are required to give
the NHTSA repair data for six quar
ters after they send a notification let
ter to owners. If repair rates are ex
ceptionally low, DeMeter said, the
NHTSA will occasionally require an
automaker to send a second notice.
Ford Motor Co. has one of the high
est repair rates — around 80 percent
— because it sends multiple letters to
owners instead of the one letter the
NHTSA requires, DeMeter said. Char
lie Kopeika, Ford’s manager of recalls,
said the company will send up to five
letters and postcards over two years.
Ford buys registration data from
states to track down vehicles even af
ter they’ve changed owners. Despite
those efforts, a certain percentage of
owners are never found, Kopeika said.
The oldest Ford recall that the NHTSA
is still tracking, a 1999 recall of Wind
star minivans with a fuel tank prob
lem, shows 3,253 of the 83,052 owners
were never reached. Automakers don’t
have to contact owners if the vehicles
have been moved abroad.
Repair rates for newer vehicles are
generally higher. As of Sept. 30, one
year after they were recalled because
of a fuel tank defect, 90.6 percent of
2004 Toyota Sienna minivans had been
repaired. By comparison, the repair
rate for older models of the
Volkswagen New Beetle was 56.7 per
cent on Sept. 30, a year after they were
recalled because of faulty brake lights.
Federal law has required automak
ers to provide free repairs for safety-re
lated defects since 1966. Since then,
more than 366 million vehicles have
been recalled in the United States.
Automakers won’t reveal how much
they spend on recalls, but the costs go
into the billions. The Automotive In
dustry Action Group, a Michigan-based
advocacy group for the auto industry,
said automakers can save $25 million
for every 10 percent decrease in the
time it takes to find a defect. Earlier this
year, GM cited high recall costs as a
drag on its second-quarter profits.
Despite the expense of providing
repairs, Kopeika said manufacturers
can be trusted to make sure owners
know about recalls.
“It’s a huge customer satisfaction
issue,” Kopeika said.
Washington state faces possible third vote recount
Dino Rossi was declared the state's governor-elect,
but his opponent could contest the 42-vote margin
BY DAVID AMMONS
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
OLYMPIA, Wash. — Republican
Dino Rossi took up the mantle of gov
ernor-elect on Tuesday, but an un
precedented third vote count could
keep Rossi and Democratic rival
Christine Gregoire guessing until al
most Christmas — or later.
Secretary of State Sam Reed, the
state’s chief elections officer, certified
Rossi as the victor by a mere 42
votes. Reed called it the closest gov
ernor’s race in U.S. history, with
a margin of little more than a
r
thousandth of 1 percentage point
separating winner and loser.
Reed said Rossi’s recount victory
means he’s legally the governor-elect.
Rossi took up the title, no matter
how short-lived. He told a victory
news conference he’s moving for
ward with selecting a cabinet and
preparing plans to stir the anemic
state economy.
He reached out to Democrats, par
ticularly those who control both
houses of the Legislature.
Rossi acknowledged his victory isn’t
assured, however, since Gregoire and
the state Democratic Party are expect
ed to demand a manual recount of all
or part of the state on Friday.
He didn’t use the word “concede,”
but made it clear he thinks Gregoire
should drop her challenge. In an inter
view, Rossi said she and the Democ
rats “have to decide if they’ll be look
ing at the best interest of the state of
Washington and be gracious.”
Rossi, 45, a former legislative pow
er who rose from poverty to riches in
real estate investments, told reporters
Gregoire “ran a spirited campaign,
and she has to decide if she’s going to
go forward or not (with a recount). ”
“If you count and recount and
recount and keep on counting until
you finally win, what do you really
have in the end? An illegitimate
020922
Cultural Cleansing
Destroying
A COMMUNITY.
Erasing
MEMORY.
For twenty-five years the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has
persecuted the Baha’i's, a peaceful, law-abiding religious minority. More than
two hundred leading Baha’is have been put to death, tens of thousands have lost
their jobs, tens of thousands more have felt compelled to leave their homeland,
Baha’i youth have been denied access to higher education, and retired workers
have had their pensions summarily canceled. In 1991 an official government
document signed by Supreme Leader Khamenei spelled out
measures aimed at slowly strangling the community.
The hatred of the extremist mullahs for the Baha'is is such
that they, like the Taliban of Afghanistan who destroyed the
towering Buddhist sculptures at Bamiyan, intend not only to
eradicate the religion, but even to erase all traces of its existence
in the country of its birth. It was for this reason they demolished
the House of the Bab in Shiraz, center of pilgrimage for the
Baha’is of the world and a gem of the city’s cherished past. This
is why they confiscated Baha’i cemeteries and bulldozed the
graves of Baha’i heroes and saints. This is why they desecrated
the resting place of Quddus, one of the apostles of the faith.
This June a wrecking crew descended upon a historical
monument, a precious example of Islamic-lranian architecture, “a matchless
model of art, spirituality, and architecture.” “How is it,” a brave Tehran
newspaper article asked, “that in the middle of. the day... the very essence of our
cultural heritage is being destroyed?” The answer is heartbreakingly simple.
The demolished building was the house of a great nineteenth-century
statesman, calligrapher and literary figure, Mirza Abbas Nuri. Although he was
born and died a Muslim, his son, Baha’u’llah, founded the Baha’i Faith,
a religion that promotes abolition of all prejudice, independent investigation of
truth, equality of women and men, universal education, harmony of religion and
science, and universal peace. For this the clerical bigots have declared Baha’is,
followers of Baha’u’llah, to be heretics and apostates, deserving of death.
In their determination to rid Iran of the Baha’i community and obliterate
its very memory, the fundamentalists in power are prepared even to destroy the
cultural heritage of their own country, which they appear not to realize they
hold in trust for humankind. Surely the time has come for Iranians everywhere
to raise their voices in protest against such willful desecrations.
For more information, please visit www.bahaiworldnews.org.
Friday December 3, 4-6:00pm
Knight Library Browsing Room, University of Oregon
sponsored by the (JO Bahd Y Campus Association in collaboration with the (JO
Chapter of Amnesty International and the Spiritual Assembly of the Bahd Y of Eugene
usna-oea@usbnc.org
■ V. * iVt'tVVtViVi’t V*’*1* V*'*
governorship, that’s what you have
in the end,” he said. “It’s time to
move forward; that’s the message.”
Rossi planned a victory celebration
in Bellevue Thesday night.
“It feels good. We’re in the right
spot,” Rossi said in an interview. “It’s
the second time we’ve been validat
ed as the winner. This is over.”
Unlike Rossi’s public display of tri
umph, Gregoire, 57, the state attorney
general for the past 12 years, kept out
of sight and worked on a recount strat
egy — and her own transition efforts.
Gregoire rejected the notion that
Rossi had won.
“Sen. Rossi and I are both moving
ahead with our transition plans, even
though the election is undecided,” she
said in a statement released by her
r
campaign. “It’s still the wise thing to
do. By going ahead with our transition
plans, both candidates will be in a po
sition to lead the state in January.”
Her statement said the race re
mains too close to call, with what the
campaign called “thousands of dis
puted ballots across the state.”
Democrats were still mulling how
extensive the manual recount should
be. Spokeswoman Kirstin Brost said
the campaign and the party would
prefer a full statewide recount of all
6,686 precincts, but might not be able
to afford the cost.
The state wants a 25-cent-per-vot
er deposit at the time the recount is
demanded — at least $700,000 for a
statewide count.
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