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If you're one drink or toke over the Westchester County line, or drag racing, you could wind up kissing your car goodbye.

Adding to the obvious reasons not to, the county's legislature is poised to pass a new vehicle forfeiture law that would let cops seize the vehicles of drivers convicted of driving while impaired or drag racing on Westchester roads.

"The prospect of forfeiting one's car, often an expensive material possession, will cause people to think twice before getting drunk and getting behind the wheel," said Bill Ryan, chairman of the Westchester County Board of Legislators.

The bill gained momentum following recent high-profile drunken-driving tragedies like the July Taconic State Parkway crash. In that incident, Diane Schuler was allegedly intoxicated as she drove the wrong way on the parkway and killed eight people, including four children in her car and three Yonkers men in the car she collided with.

According to the state Division of Criminal Justice Services, adult arrests in Westchester County for felony and misdemeanor DWI offenses rose from 2,337 to 2,650 between 2002 and 2007.

The Westchester County Department of Probation reports that DWI cases represent the largest percentage of their total cases, at 23%.

Nationwide, drunken driving kills about 17,000 people annually, and 80% of those fatal accidents involve repeat offenders.

The National Transportation Safety Board finds that vehicle forfeiture laws serve as a deterrent to DWI recidivism and may reduce first-time offenses as well.

The proposed law would include an "innocent owner" defense to stop the forfeiture of a vehicle when the owner did not know that the vehicle would be used in a violation.

The bill also contains a "hardship relief" provision, allowing relief from forfeiture in cases in which the defendant can establish that losing his or her car would impose substantial burdens on the defendant's ability to get to work, school or medical treatment.

Such hardship relief could be subject to conditions, including installation of a Breathalyzer ignition interlock device in the vehice.