Legislative Watch 
LEGISLATIVE
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12/2/03-A California lawmaker wants to outlaw the manufacture, sale, purchase, use or possession of controllers that can change some traffic signals from red to green.
Sen. Kevin Murray, D-Los Angeles, has drafted a bill to ban the sale or use of Mobile Infrared Transmitters, or MIRT, by anyone other than public safety and transit agencies.
The devices are not regulated by current federal standards because they rely on a beam of light instead of a radio wave to trigger the light-changing mechanisms that have been attached to some intersections.
A traffic-light changer is designed to allow police, fire and other emergency officials to clear intersections before they approach. The device has been in use at intersections since the early 1970s.
A recent U.S. Department of Transportation survey showed the devices are in use at 26,500 intersections in 78 cities across the country.
