Even if driving with a suspended license is decriminalized, courts would still disproportionately demand hours of poor peoples labor to pay off fines.
Even if driving with a suspended license is decriminalized, courts would still disproportionately demand hours of poor peoples' labor to pay off fines. ERNEST R. PRIM/SHUTTERSTOCK

From the Seattle Times:

Sponsored by Sen. Joe Fain, R-Auburn, Senate Bill 6189 would decriminalize the charge of third-degree driving with a suspended license, a misdemeanor.

(...)

SB 6189 would remove its misdemeanor status and make the charge a traffic infraction with a $250 penalty. The penalty would be reduced to $50 if a defendant could show he or she got the license reinstated.

Driving with a suspended license is one of the most common misdemeanors charged in municipal courts, and civil rights advocates say it's one of the most common ways the criminal justice system ensnares people of color and the poor. Courts can suspend licenses for failure to pay traffic fines. Evidence has shown that police disproportionately pull over black drivers and charge them with more serious offenses than white drivers in Washington State.

In 2015, Washington State increased the financial penalties for driving infractions, a rule change railed against by former King County Superior Court Judge Ronald Kessler. In an e-mail to his colleagues, Kessler walked through how increasing the financial burden of traffic infractions could lead to increased misdemeanor charges for suspended licenses, or for the poor, de facto sentences of laboring on a work crew to pay off the increased fines.

The bill, of course, doesn't solve the latter problem. If your license is suspended because you failed to pay fines for traffic infractions and you're tagged with a $250 fine—let's assume you can't afford to pay that either—you're still stuck negotiating with a court to work off what you owe in the form of community restitution.