It's not smart or safe to drive a motor vehicle when you're drunk. Now it's more expensive than ever before in one small Bay Area city.
A driver convicted of a DUI has to pay the DMV, the courts and lawyers -- and now the city of Oakley, in Contra Costa County, is cashing in on the money train by issuing bills to drunk drivers for the cost of everything from emergency responders to drug tests to tow truck fees.
The bills can range from $381 to almost $800 and are itemized:
- breath
- blood test
- urine test
- vehicle removal
- staff time
The bills are heftier depending on how high-ranking of a police officer processed a DUI -- from $92 an hour for a rank-and-file cop to over $115 per hour for a lieutenant.
The Oakley City Council adopted the law that allows the city to charge DUI offenders for the joy of being brought into the criminal justice system in January, and with perhaps good reason -- the town is the Bay Area's DUI capital, with its 601 DUI arrests in 2010 four times the average of nearby cities.
