Push For Stronger BWI Laws Set To Begin In December As General Assembly Returns To Jeff City

With the 2024 Missouri General Assembly just a couple months away, tougher measures for boating while intoxicated offenses are expected to be introduced during the prefiling period which begins in December.

Keeping a close eye on those measures will be Sherry Terrell, the sister of Marie Steinkuehler of High Ridge who was killed in a drunken boating accident at Lake of the Ozarks in July of 2020, who recalls receiving that news.

“My dad is screaming. It’s so bad, Sherry. It’s so bad. Marie’s. Marie’s gone, and Hayden and Brad are….They’re not going to make it. They’re not going to make it. And Marie’s gone. It was just so confusing. Imagine being woke up in the middle of the night to that.”

The Terrell family which founded the Big Bass Bash events is teaming up with lake area Representative Dr. Lisa Thomas to get legislation to the governor’s desk to put more teeth into B-W-I enforcement.

Thomas says it’s her goal to get the state on board with the B-U-I-equals-D-U-I public awareness campaign spearheaded by Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

Terrell, who appeared with Thomas and Al McCulloch from the Big Bass Bash events on KRMS Radio and TV this week, goes on to say, without some tougher laws on the books, there no telling how many times others will receive the same kind of phone call she received

“There’s no partisan issues here. This this affects everybody. You know, somebody that somebody else loves will die on this lake next year.”