Q: Roger Recupero of Pomona reported that all the Tesla cars he and his wife have seen out and about are missing a front license plate. “We keep seeing more and more of them around town and on the road. The last time I checked, California required both front and rear license plates. Does Tesla have a special agreement that exempts them from the law?” Recupero asked.

A: Nope, Tesla owners are not exempt from California’s law that requires a front and rear license plate. So what’s going on here? After reading several Tesla blogs online and doing a little research about this issue, it appears that many Tesla owners do not put a front license plate on their Tesla, because, well … they just don’t want to. This might seem like a minor issue to some people, and it’s not law enforcement’s most pressing concern, but the front license plate issue is indeed a “thing” among owners of high-end luxury cars who feel that attaching the front plate will ruin the car’s sleek or stylish appearance. They often have to purchase a mounting part to attach the front license plate to the vehicle.

The law requiring a front license plate was enacted in California and many other states in the interest of public safety – it helps law enforcement officers quickly identify vehicles from the front and back – but several other states don’t require the front license plate. Any Tesla driver missing their front plate in California could receive a citation.

Q: Yuvia Gonzales of Los Angeles was recently driving in the Los Angeles area on several freeways when she said a gym bag full of personal belongings fell out of the trunk of her car on the freeway (she wasn’t sure exactly where). She asked where she could call to see if anyone picked up her bag so she might get it back.

A: We sympathize with Gonzales because this can unfortunately happen to any driver, on any freeway. People have been known to drive off with their purse accidentally left on the trunk of the car, for instance. Gonzales can call the California Highway Patrol area office for Los Angeles as a first step to see if the gym bag was found and turned in. If this happens to you on a state highway in Riverside or San Bernardino county, call Caltrans’ Public Affairs office at 909-383-4631 and leave a message. “We monitor calls throughout the day since we are still out of the office for COVID restrictions,” said Caltrans Inland Empire spokesperson Terri Kasinga.

Finally, this bit of news about commuting came recently from UC Riverside: your vehicle could be exposing you to cancer-causing chemicals if you spend too much time driving.

A new UCR study says that spending too much time in your vehicle can expose you to carcinogens emitted from parts of the vehicle itself. The UCR study found that the average commuter in California is exceeding what the university says is considered the danger threshold for exposure to dangerous chemicals from the vehicle, and commuters could face a higher risk for cancer and birth defects.

Two carcinogenic chemicals used in automobile manufacturing – Benzene and formaldehyde — are known to cause cancer at or above certain levels of exposure. “These chemicals are very volatile, moving easily from plastics and textiles to the air that you breathe,” said David Volz, UCR professor of environmental toxicology, in a news release from UCR.

The new study, published in the journal Environment International, calculated the daily dose of benzene and formaldehyde being inhaled by drivers with commutes of at least 20 minutes per day, UCR said. The study found that up to 90% of the population in Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange, Santa Clara, and Alameda counties have at least a 10% chance of exceeding the cancer risk from inhaling these chemicals, based on having 30-minute average commute times. This isn’t great news for Inland Empire folks with long commutes.

To mitigate the danger from the vehicle, commuters are advised to keep their windows open while driving if possible so the air flow can dilute the concentration of chemicals in the car.