My opinions story

On Saturday, May 7^th, Austin citizens will have the chance to vote for a proposition called Prop 1. This will decide how background checks for ridesharing companies like Uber and Lyft will be regulated.

Ridesharing Works for Austin is the organization pushing the proposition, and a decent amount of people agree with their views. After research, I personally disagree and believe that a no vote is the better choice here.

Last December, the city council voted for the ordinance put in place currently. This ordinance does have fingerprint based background checks.

          If Prop 1 passes, then the current ordinance will be repealed, Uber and Lyft will be responsible for background checks, and drivers will not have to give their fingerprints.

If Prop 1 is rejected, drivers will have to undergo fingerprint based background checks done by the city and run through the FBI’s database.

Officials with both companies have criticized fingerprint requirements as overly burdensome and unnecessary. Drivers working fewer than 20 hours a week are critical to the reliability of their services, they say, and requiring them to visit an office to be fingerprinted dissuades many from signing up. I can completely see their point, and I acknowledge how the current laws are detrimental to them. However, having people giving their fingerprints isn’t nearly as important as the public’s safety.

          One of the main things that really unsettles me about Uber and Lyft doing their own background checks is that in San Francisco and Los Angeles, Uber had been ordered to pay 10-25 million.

Apparently, Uber had misleading claims about the quality of its background checks. Do we really want that kind of trouble in Austin? And that isn’t the only misleading thing.

          Some of you may have seen the Prop 1 commercial explaining the benefits of Prop 1. But this commercial is deceptive. The commercial implies that if Prop 1 pass and take effect, that background checks will not be required, which is completely wrong.

The truth is that there will be background checks no matter how the vote turns out. The ad was created to make the viewers think they are voting for background checks, not for Uber and Lyft to do the background checks. And let me ask you this: Why else would a group be deceptive to the public if they weren’t lying or hiding something?

          Uber’s aggressiveness for Prop 1 is shown when Uber threatened to cease operations in Austin if the proposition is not accepted. But in Houston, they have continued to operate despite a regulation that requires drivers there to undergo fingerprint based background checks.

          Not to mention the companies are desperately trying to buy out their opposers, donating 2.2 million dollars for Prop 1 to pass.

The ballot will also ask voters if the original ordinance should be repealed and replaced with a law that would “prohibit required fingerprinting, repeal the requirement to identify the vehicles with a distinctive emblem" and "repeal the prohibition against loading and unloading passengers in a travel lane."

          Prop 1 will cause the companies to be able to control all background checks, allowing them to be deceptive just like they were in San Francisco. However, if we keep our current regulations, background checks become more thorough, and the people safer. So who do you listen to: the deceptive, rich businesses, or the city council we have ourselves voted for? Don’t fall for Prop 1, and vote a straight, fat, NO to Prop 1.