Right to Repair Heats Up In The States

With the dawning of a new year, long-stalled right to repair legislation is moving in more than a dozen states. Could 2021 be the year that one (or more) pass?

Like most everything else in 2020, the right to repair movement in the U.S. took a back seat to the COVID 19 pandemic, a mass casualty event that has killed more Americans than World War II , upended our economy, tanked federal and state coffers and driven college kids and school children alike off campus and back to their bedrooms.

The movement was off to a strong start in 2020, with right to repair legislation proposed in more than 20 states. Those hearings produced some notable successes: testimony supporting Right to Repair legislation in Washington State by SecuRepairs member Tarah Wheeler went viral. (Watch it here.) In Massachusetts, right to repair legislation was voted out of a joint committee early in 2020, potentially clearing the way for consideration by the full legislature later in the year - a first. Needless to say: that didn’t happen.

But, with the emergence of COVID vaccines in late 2020 and the arrival of 2021, legislatures are finally getting back to work, and right to repair is on the agenda. So far, legislators in 14 states have brought forth right to repair legislation in various forms.

They are: Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, Vermont, and Washington state. Repair advocates say that twenty or more states could eventually consider right to repair laws in some form this legislative season, matching what we saw in 2020.

“The trend is MORE states but more importantly more committed sponsors and co-sponsors,” said Gay Gordon-Byrne, the Executive Director of The Repair Coalition.  And, in a period of stark partisan divisions, right to repair laws often enjoy bi-partisan backing in state houses.

“Support has come from all sides politically,” said Gordon-Byrne. “It’s one of the very few points of agreement between D(emocrats) and R(epublicans), I(ndependents), and L(ibertarians).”

Massachusetts voters set the tone in November, backing an expansion of that state’s automobile right to repair law by more than 3 to 1. The measure, which gives vehicle owners access to maintenance and repair data sent over wireless telematics systems, received more votes than any ballot measure in the state’s history.

Proposed Laws Take Many Forms

The bills offered so far show the breadth of the right to repair movement across the U.S. In states like Vermont, South Carolina, Florida, Nebraska and Montana, the right to repair bills are narrowly tailored to agricultural equipment. That’s a reflection of the widespread outrage over stories about farmers being locked out of their own equipment that have recently broken through to mainstream media outlets like NPR and New York Times.

Farming States Look to Ag Repair

In Nebraska, for example, the proposed legislation, Bill 543, mandates that manufacturers of “electronics-enabled agricultural equipment” sold or used in the state “shall make available, for purposes of diagnosis, maintenance, or repair of such equipment…documentation, parts, and tools, inclusive of any updates to information or embedded software” to “any independent repair provider, or to the owner of electronics-enabled agricultural equipment. For equipment that contains an electronic security lock or other security-related function, the law requires OEMs to make available to the owner and to independent repair providers on fair and reasonable terms “any special documentation, tools, and parts needed to disable the lock or function, and to reset it when disabled in the course of diagnosis, maintenance, or repair of the equipment.”

In that state, the powerful Nebraska Farm Bureau has been anxious to get a right to repair law in place, but has - in the past- looked to manufacturers to create voluntary programs. This year may see the group get behind legislation to force their hand.

COVID prompts Medical Repair Laws

The COVID pandemic has also shone a light on the hurdles that manufacturer restrictions on repair have erected for hospitals and health care providers. In the first wave of COVID cases last Spring, in fact, demand for ventilators spawned Project BioMed, a grass roots effort to locate and index repair manuals and other information needed to maintain medical devices like ventilators.

In 2021, at least one state, Hawaii, is trying to write medical device repair into law. That state’s Senate Bill 760 requires manufacturers of “powered medical equipment” costing $100 or more to make “parts, equipment, tools, and documentation available to independent repair providers and purchasers of such equipment.”

Nathan Proctor, the head of U.S. PIRG’s Right to Repair efforts told me that 2021 is bringing more interest in medical device repair due to COVID. Another byproduct of COVID: more emphasis on access to devices and eliminating the digital divide. Disparities in access to technology came into glaring relief after COVID “relegated so many of us to remote school, work, family gatherings, etc.” Proctor said. The economic disruptions caused by COVID, which threw millions of Americans out of work, put a greater emphasis on family budget issues, as well, he said.

Manufacturers practices spur backlash

While COVID has highlighted particular aspects of the repair dilemma in the U.S., much of the momentum in the states is being driven by grass roots opposition to the restrictive, anti-consumer practices of manufacturers, said Byrne.

“The more people learn about how they are getting screwed -- the more they support legislation,” she said. Each effort by giant corporations like Apple, Samsung or John Deere introduce features that frustrate or prevent servicing puts wind in the sails of the right to repair movement, Gordon-Byrne said. “Every dastardly thing Apple, John Deere and {insert a big bad guy] does to their customers to block repairs and reuse generates thousands more grass-roots supporters.  

We’ll be covering the battle in the states in more detail in the weeks and months ahead, so stay tuned and remember to spread the word about the Fight to Repair to your repair-minded friends and colleagues!