It's always hard for an older person to make the life-altering decision to give up the car keys and concede that age has eroded the ability to drive safely. It's even harder when that person is a local elected official juggling a constant stream of urgent constituent requests to attend events.
That's the issue facing 80-year-old Baltimore County Councilman T. Bryan McIntire, who has had five crashes in the past seven years, including one in a county-issued car earlier this month. And it's a dilemma many of us, whether we are public figures or not, will face long before we want to.
We live in a society that is far from kind to those who cannot — or will not — drive. Our transit systems are far from adequate. Without mobility, it's easy to become isolated, dependent and depressed. For the older person who is trying to continue working, the stakes are even greater.
But the stakes in such decisions go far beyond the needs and desires of the individual senior. When an older person's skills have eroded, it puts everyone who shares the roads with that driver at risk.
In an interview Friday, McIntire said he has thought about such matters since the June 3 crash in which police say he failed to yield the right of way while making a left turn and hit a car driven by a 17-year-old girl. Neither was injured.
McIntire said he has since concluded that he is still fit to drive, though he said he will not request another county-issued car.
"I still feel I'm a competent driver," he said.
McIntire said he's been driving since he was 16 and had never had an accident until his spate of crashes began seven years ago. He said his eyesight is still sharp. And his answers in the interview were those of a man in full possession of his faculties.
The veteran Republican councilman said his crashes were largely a result of his hurrying around his enormous north county district — which he said comprises 325 square miles — to get from one constituent meeting to another.
"People can be very demanding," McIntire said, adding that his colleagues face similar stress.
"I know they're under the same pressure to get from place to place, and they drive accordingly," the councilman said.
McIntire said he's going to cut back. "At my age I'm going to limit the number of functions I attend and make sure there's an abundance of time between one and another," he said. He noted that he's made other concessions to age, including cutting back on night driving.
It's not the role of a newspaper columnist to judge whether that's enough, and the law is little help. Powerful advocacy groups for seniors, whose dedication to voting every politician respects, oppose any arbitrary age cutoffs. And it's true that many people in their 80s and even 90s continue to drive safely.
But we all know there are seniors who drive long after they should have given up the keys. In some cases, sons and daughters plead with aged parents to stop driving only to run into a brick wall of pride and denial.
McIntire said it's an issue he's discussed with his family and others close to him. And he said he has certain criteria in mind for when he'll know it's time.
That's probably something we should all focus on — long before we're eligible for Social Security. From the vantage point of my 50s, it's easy to say I'll make the right decisions at 80. But maybe at 80, I won't be thinking as clearly. It's been known to happen.
There is only one valid moral test to be used in deciding whether an older person should drive, and it's not the burden it will put on that person or that person's family. It's whether one's continued driving is safe for that 17-year-old girl who could be driving the other car.
When my time comes, if it comes, I hope to make the right decision. That's why I'm telling my son that if in his judgment I'm no longer fit to drive, take the keys. And if I've turned into a stubborn old cuss who refuses to give them up, confront me with these written words from a time I was more objective.
And you don't have to work for a newspaper to put your wishes in writing now and empower a person you trust to act in the future.
As for the councilman, here's wishing him luck. He's had a long, distinguished career in public service. It's good he's consulting his family, but there's one other person he should listen to: the younger T. Bryan McIntire who was state's attorney in Carroll County in the 1960s. What would he have said to his older self?
McIntire, who is running for re-election, said he sees no way to do his job without driving. That shouldn't be. If his constituents still value his services enough to elect him, and if at any time he decides to hang up the keys, the taxpayers ought to pay his cab fare to all work-related events. His colleagues should insist he accept.
As tight as budgets are, the county can afford it. A legal judgment could cost much more. And elder statesmen deserve consideration.