Dash Cams in Kansas: No Permitted-Items List, Only an Obstruction Test

It is worth being precise about what Kansas does not have, because several states answer this question with an enumerated list. A full-text search of the Kansas Statutes Annotated on the Office of Revisor of Statutes site returns the word "windshield" in only seven sections: K.S.A. 8-1703 (when lighted lamps are required), 8-1719 (spot and auxiliary lamp aiming), 8-1741 (windshields and windows), 8-1743 (safety glazing), 8-1749a (sun screening devices), 8-2118 (the uniform fine schedule) and 8-2910 (driverless-capable vehicles). None of them enumerates permitted windshield items, and the phrase "mounted on the windshield" returns nothing at all. Kansas also has no television or video-screen-visible-to-the-driver offence: searching "video display" returns only K.S.A. 74-8702, a Kansas Lottery definitions section.

That leaves K.S.A. 8-1741 doing all the work. Subsection (a) is a standard rather than a list. It prohibits driving a motor vehicle with any sign, poster or other nontransparent material upon the front windshield, side wings, or side or rear windows which substantially obstructs, obscures or impairs the driver's clear view of the highway or of any intersecting highway. Three things follow for a dash cam. The material must be nontransparent, and a camera housing is. It must be on the glass, so a device on the dashboard rather than suction-cupped to the windshield is outside the subsection altogether. And the obstruction must be substantial and must impair the view of the highway or an intersecting highway, so a compact camera tucked behind the rear-view mirror in the swept area's shadow is a very different case from a large unit low in the driver's sightline.

The word "substantially" carries real weight in Kansas. The Revisor's annotation to K.S.A. 8-1749a records State v. Rose, 234 Kan. 1044, 1051 (1984), for the proposition that use of "substantially" establishes with reasonable certainty what conduct is proscribed, and the annotation to 8-1741 records State v. Carpenter, 231 Kan. 235 (1982), which declared part of K.S.A. 8-1701(a) void for vagueness and held that a cracked windshield was not covered by it. Federal courts applying Kansas law have treated a cracked windshield as supplying reasonable suspicion for a stop in U.S. v. Callarman, 273 F.3d 1284, 1287 (2001) and U.S. v. Duque-Nava, 315 F. Supp. 2d 1144, 1151 (2004), both annotated on the Revisor's page for 8-1741.

The rest of the section is about glass and wipers rather than mounted devices. Subsection (b) prohibits driving with a damaged front windshield or side or rear windows that substantially obstructs the clear view. Subsection (c) requires the windshield to carry a device for clearing rain, snow or other moisture, controlled or operated by the driver, and subsection (d) requires every windshield wiper to be maintained in good working order. A dash cam mounted where it fouls the wiper's swept area therefore risks a second complaint under (c) and (d) as well as the obstruction complaint under (a).

One Kansas rule that is often assumed to apply does not. The AS1 line limit in K.S.A. 8-1749a(a)(1) governs sun screening devices, defined by K.S.A. 8-1749b(a) as film material or a device designed to be used with safety glazing for reducing the effects of the sun. A camera is not a sun screening device, so the AS1 boundary does not set a mounting height for one. Nor does the Kansas texting ban reach a dash cam: K.S.A. 8-15,111(a)(1) defines a "wireless communication device" as one that provides voice or data communication between two or more parties, and a record-only camera does not, so operating it is not writing, sending or reading a written communication under 8-15,111(b).

On the audio the camera captures, Kansas is a one-party consent state. K.S.A. 21-6101(a)(1) makes it breach of privacy to intercept a message by telephone, telegraph, letter or other means of private communication "without the consent of the sender or receiver," so a driver recording a conversation they are part of has that consent. Paragraph (a)(4) is the paragraph to watch for a camera left running with passengers aboard, because it reaches using a device to record sounds originating inside a "private place" without the consent of persons entitled to privacy there, and subsection (f) defines a private place as one where a person may reasonably expect to be safe from uninvited intrusion or surveillance.

A. A. 8-1701(a), which makes any violation of article 17 a traffic infraction except for the sections it lists, and 8-1741 is not among the excepted sections. A. 8-2118(c) prices the offence, listed as "Defective wipers; obstructed windshield or windows," at $45. A. 8-2118(b) a driver may enter a written appearance, waive trial and pay that amount plus court costs before the appearance date; under 8-2118(a) a fine on a plea at the appearance may be no greater than the scheduled amount. A. A. A.

21-6611(d) caps a court-imposed traffic infraction fine at $500. A. 8-1759a on reasonable cause to believe a vehicle is not equipped as required, must give written notice of the defect found, and may require that the vehicle not be operated under its own power if further operation would be hazardous. A. A. 12-4305 and it may differ from $45.