Governor signs Benton's antifreeze bill

“It only takes a tablespoon to kill you,” Benton noted, referencing a widely publicized murder case in which a woman killed her husband by slipping antifreeze into his food.

Antifreeze is commonly used to poison dogs because its sweet taste appeals to animals. That factor also leads animals, including birds, to sip antifreeze that has leaked from vehicles or been spilled.

Davis approached Benton before the 2008 legislative session.

“She was the one who did a lot of the legwork on the information,” Benton recalled. “When she came to me, she said these state have enacted a law to put a bitterant in antifreeze. We took one of them and used it as a model for ours.”

The House passed the bill in 2008, but it stalled in the Senate Rules Committee. Benton reintroduced the bill in 2009, but it got hung up in the House Rules Committee, Benton said, because of his participation in a challenge to House speaker Glenn Richardson.

In 2010, the House passed the bill, but it stalled in the Senate Rules Committee, apparently because Benton opposed the Senate leadership’s legislation calling for school vouchers. Finally, this year both the House and the Senate approved the bill.

Benton said manufacturers of antifreeze favored the legislation, which included a label advising that the manufacturer will not be liable if an engine fails because of the bitterant.
Benton estimated that the addition could increase the cost of antifreeze by five cents per gallon.