1. A method for providing a torque overlay command in a collision avoidance system that is at least part of a torque command provided to an electric power steering (EPS) motor on a vehicle, said method comprising: providing a mathematical model of a vehicle steering system; determining a difference between a current vehicle path and a desired vehicle path; providing model predictive control to determine an optimal total column torque command for the motor that minimizes the difference; providing an EPS torque assist command based on vehicle speed; determining the torque overlay command using the optimal total column torque command, a driver provided torque and the EPS torque assist command for a particular vehicle speed, where determining the torque overlay command includes solving a nonlinear algebraic equation given by: 
 ƒ(TBT+TO)+HWT+TO=TT where TBT is the driver provided torque, TO is the torque overlay command, HWT is hand-wheel torque, TT is the total column torque command, and ƒ is a function defining the EPS torque assist command, and a Newton-Raphson iteration technique is used to solve the equation; and providing the total column torque command to the EPS motor.