Sacramento Bee: Senate Transportation Chair Opens Up About Autonomous Vehicles

To be clear, Sen. Dave Cortese, D-San Jose, says he doesn’t want to ban autonomous vehicles, or AVs. He says he’s even willing to ride in one, sometime.

“I’ve done more perilous things in my life,” he joked.

But he does have some concerns about how robotaxi companies like Waymo have been operating in California. More than that, he has concerns about local governments being able to have a say in those operations within their jurisdictions.

“It’s not just a matter of local control, it’s a matter of getting the locals into the game,” Cortese said, later adding that “they’re on the sidelines and we need to get them fully engaged.”

That’s why Cortese authored SB 915, a bill to give local governments the power to decide for themselves whether they want AVs operating on their streets. 

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