There are too many accidents every day that include fatalities from drunken driving. The legal percent blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level today for NY State is .10 BAC. It is proven that states that have passed .08 BAC laws have declined in crashes by 16 to 18 percent. If every state passed that same law, many people's lives would be saved every year.
             Here are the facts: -- An average 170-pound man must have four drinks in one hour on an empty stomach to reach a .08 BAC level. A 137-pound woman would reach .08 BAC after about three drinks in an hour on an empty stomach - a level that exceeds what is commonly accepted as social drinking. There are some groups that oppose the concept of lowering the BAC level in states holding that, 'many? of the fatal accidents that happen on the road today include drivers that have a BAC level of .10 BAC or higher. The exact numbers taken from The National Conference of State Legislators report that in a fatal accident involving alcohol, only 5 percent of the drivers had a BAC level of .08 to .099 while 83 percent had levels of .10 or higher. How can they protest that there is only 5 percent, when lives are at stake? You must ask yourself this question -- is there an acceptable risk when people's lives are at risk? Regardless of how much alcohol it takes to get to this level, at .08 BAC any driver is a dangerous threat on the road. .08 BAC is the level at which the fatal crash risk significantly increases and virtually everyone is seriously impaired, affecting all of the basic critical driving skills including: braking, steering, lane changing, judgment and response time (NHTSA). The risk of a driver being killed in a crash at .08 BAC is at least 11 times that of drivers without alcohol in their system. At .10 BAC the risk is at least 29 times higher. That is not an acceptable risk. More than 20 percent of alcohol-related traffic deaths involve BAC levels below .10 percent (NHTSA). I...