Distracted driver legislation in memory of Anaconda woman sputters in House

Four years ago, a young woman, Chloe Worl, was killed shortly before 8 a.m. outside of Dillon by a distracted driver.

The other driver, texting on her phone and using Snapchat, slammed Worl’s pickup at 60 mph. Worl, who was 25 and working at Barrett Hospital at the time, was killed instantly. 

The driver who killed Worl avoided jail time for the death. 

Montana does not have laws making distracted driving illegal, something some lawmakers this session sought to change with Senate Bill 359.

Some municipalities, like Helena and Billings, already have distracted driving laws. Signs dot the towns, reminding motorists to look up at the road, not down at their phones.

But efforts to bring distracted driving laws statewide have stalled.

“She was an amazing young lady whose life was cut too short, but she’s one of many,” said Sen. Sara Novak, an Anaconda Democrat who pushed distracted driving legislation this session. “This keeps happening.”

There were 203 traffic fatalities in 2024, according to the Montana Department of Transportation. That number was less than 200 in 2023. Many of the fatal crashes have been clustered in the southwestern portion of the state.

Nationally, fatalities are more common in rural areas than urban, and more than 3,200 people died in crashes caused by distracted driving in 2023.

Worl held a degree from the University of Montana Western in molecular biology and had planned to attend the University of Montana’s pharmacy school. She was a hunter, an avid horseback rider, a National Honors Society member and musically gifted.

Her death shocked not only the Dillon community, but north in Anaconda as well. Worl was a Copperhead, a graduate of Anaconda High School and a four-year softball player.

Worl’s memory still lives — her family has spoken in favor of legislation seeking to penalize distracted driving and there’s even an annual scholarship in her name.

“We’ve learned a lot since this tragedy has happened to us,” Keith Worl, Chloe’s father, said during a Senate Transportation hearing for SB 359 in late February. “I guess it’s also fueled our fire to not have this tragedy happen to anybody else we know.”

Chloe Worl’s memory lives in Novak’s mind too. Novak’s Senate Bill 359 would have added penalties for distracted driving.

While the session is not over quite yet, the effort has stalled. The legislation passed the Senate, but was tabled in the House Judiciary Committee.

Two attempts to blast SB 359, both by legislators from nearby districts, failed during the last two weeks. The first motion to move it to the House floor, by Rep. Jennifer Lynch, a Butte Democrat, failed by one vote with one member, a Democrat, voting remotely.

Blast motions can only be voted on by members who are present in the chamber at the time of the vote, and if they would have had that vote on the first motion to reconsider, the legislation likely would have seen the House floor. Rep. Scott DeMarois, a Democrat from Anaconda, brought the second blast motion to move the bill to the floor. It failed by four votes.

“For whatever reason, the stars didn’t align,” Novak said. “It’s emotional, it’s frustrating.”

Novak was Worl’s driving instructor, teaching her siblings as well. She was carrying SB 359 for the family and said last week it was her most important piece of legislation this session.

“She was a ray of sunshine,” Novak said.

It frustrated Novak, who felt “politics” played a part in the bill’s struggles, but for her the bill not going cuts even deeper.

Law enforcement and the state Department of Transportation supported the bill in its committee hearings, but trouble began in the Senate. Asking municipal courts to prosecute the charges was one issue.

There was a sense by some legislators it was an attempt by the transportation department to increase revenue by adding penalties.

“I do value life, but this bill usually goes through judiciary,” Sen. Barry Usher, R-Billings, said March 2 on the Senate floor. “But it seems to me, based on the discussion, that this is about money, because this was pushed, I guess, by the Department of Transportation, because we’re losing money.”

Comments on her intent were also lambasted by Sen. Pat Flowers, D-Belgrade, as a point of decorum during Senate floor discussion. Novak recently said the MDT trying to get more funding wasn’t the driver of the bill and made a similar comment on the floor in March.

“In terms of the attacks on MDT and my reasons for bringing this bill, I take exception to that,” Novak said on March 2. “As this bill sponsor, I did a lot of homework, and I reached out to who I thought would be of interest in this bill.”

Novak said there was some conversation about amending the bill to specifically ban texting. But this doesn’t go far enough, she said.

“It’s more than just texting,” Novak said.

A car can travel the length of a football field while glancing at a phone for five seconds at 55 mph. Other messaging apps like Snapchat can be a pull, as can social media, taking photos and changing a song.

There has been some appetite in the Legislature to regulate motorists this session, and Bobby’s Law, House Bill 267, would create a mandatory minimum for some fatal DUIs in the state.

Novak’s bill would have made it a $75 ticket on first offense for distracted driving and $150 for subsequent infractions.

The intention of Novak’s legislation wasn’t fully punitive, she said. It’s more of creating reminders, so that fewer families will be shattered by a preventable crash, she added.

“We weren’t trying to hammer anything with a bunch of heavy fines or create more work for law enforcement,” Novak said in an interview. “It was more educational and being a deterrent.”