Today’s question of minimal consequence:

Why do we say “Native Hawaiian” but “Alaska Native”? (See, e.g. 20 U.S.C. s 7265e.)

Got distracted while working today and came across a very useful piece of information: stowing away on a ship or aircraft is a federal crime. So, you know, don’t do it. That trip in your friend’s suitcase just isn’t worth it.

While a coworker has been on maternity leave, I’ve been doing the pre-publication review of agency rulemakings. It’s been fun. And sometimes there are really great errors. Like “diffuse a fight” instead of “defuse a fight.” It keeps my mind sharp.

Today I reviewed some rules about condoms. Yes, I’m giving away a little bit more detail than I usually do, because context is everything in this missed opportunity.

The agency wrote this correctly. But wouldn’t it have been great had they written it as follows, incorrectly?

“The expiration date must be supported by data demonstrating physical and mechanical integrity of the product [condom] after three discreet and representative lots…have been subjected to each of the following conditions.”

That would have been a fantastic error.

I’ve been pondering taxis all day, since I read about cab drivers protesting proposed legislation that will require them to have newer cars, etc etc. (Yes, the “etc etc” is because I haven’t actually read the bill.)

Then there was the hubbub about Uber.

And then I witnessed a cab change lanes into a car stopped at a red light. (A very nice car, I might add.)

There’s no way to fit my thoughts on taxis into 140 characters, so here we are. A few preliminaries:

1. I believe that government regulation is important and a force for good (at least when done well).

2. I rarely take cabs because I am cheap, but in DC I almost never take cabs because I almost never carry cash. The last time I wanted to take a cab (only about a month ago) I couldn’t because I wasn’t sure if the money in my wallet was enough to get me where I was going. I would have taken a cab if I could have paid by credit card.

3. I took a cab in Boston almost six years ago; I got in the cab, told the driver where I was going, and a block later he let me out because he didn’t know where my destination was. (In his defense, it was one of those street names that there’s one of in every town in Massachusetts, and in Somerville it happened to be sort of hidden.) The next cab I hailed had GPS and he took me right where I needed to be.

4. I’ve never taken Uber.

Now, with those out of the way:

Competition is good. In theory, Uber provides competition to cabs by providing a similar service under a different business model. I have no problem with Uber being regulated, and I certainly have no problem with laws being expanded to permit Uber to operate legally. I don’t know enough about today’s hubbub to address it specifically.

The (a?) problem is that Uber isn’t ubiquitous enough, or tourist-friendly enough, to serve as a real alternative such that a general boycott of cabs would be effective.

The way our taxi laws and regulations are written, the taxi industry is a monopoly. True, cab companies are owned by different people, but a cab is a cab is a cab. There’s no incentive for a cab company to upgrade its fleet or to offer amenities such as taking credit cards because it won’t get them repeat customers.

Cab drivers complain that fares are too low and cabs that aren’t falling apart are too expensive. So why not eliminate some regulations and create incentive for cab companies to compete? They can select their fares and select the amenities they want to provide (GPS, credit card readers, cabs that were built this millenium), make the information public, and let the market sort it out. Maybe people are willing to pay more than they are now for shoddy service…or maybe the cab companies will realize that given a choice, their customers don’t really want to be riding in falling apart cabs that only accept cash.

As I’ve been skimming the DC Code, I’ve started keeping track of provisions that call for “a fine of no more than $387 or imprisonment for not longer than 14 days, or both.” Numbers obviously changed to protect the innocent. Mostly I want to explore the inconsistencies, see what is simply out of date and what reflects priorities, whether good or bad.

Then there’s the occasional head shake, such as DC Code 5-121.03 which calls for a fine of no more than $500 or imprisonment for not longer than “11 months and 29 days.”

But what I want to call to your attention today is an inconsistency that I can’t make heads or tails of. It is DC Code § 7-704.01, which discusses issues related to the long-term care ombudsman. There are three different violations discussed in this section of the Code. Two of them carry a fine of up to $1000 or imprisonment up to 180 days. The third carries a larger fine ($1500) and a much shorter maximum imprisonment (30 days).

I can see how things like that happen when they are in completely separate laws. And in this case, the two $1000/180 day violations were added 22 years after the law was originally passed, so one could claim that they didn’t have the third violation and its penalties in front of them while they were drafting. Not likely. I’ve drafted legislation. You really can’t draft amendments without having in front of you what’s currently in effect. So why not make the the fines/imprisonment consistent? Not necessarily the same, but proportional. Roughly proportional.

Your ideas?

(I have two. The first is carelessness. The second is that it has something to do with criminal laws in DC have a different Congressional review period and possibly other differences in procedure, so amending the original violation was too difficult.)

DC Code § 7-201

(3) “Dead body” means a human body or such parts of such human body from the condition of which it may be reasonably concluded that death recently occurred.