GENERAL BACKGROUND
The use of proper restraint systems for each individual passenger in a motor vehicle has been found to be one of the most effective countermeasures to combat fatal injuries. All studies on the subject demonstrate that passengers who are properly restrained have a probability of fatality that is only a fraction of that attributed to those who are not buckled up. Recent studies in Alabama have demonstrated that those restrained have several times the survival rate of those who are not. This being the case, every citizen of Alabama has an obligation, not only to buckle up, but to assure that all passengers in the vehicle are also acting responsibly in this regard.
Understanding this relationship, the Alabama Legislature passed a Primary Seatbelt Law in 1999 that authorized police officials to issue citations for a failure to wear seatbelts in the absence of any other violation. This was followed by strong enforcement actions that led to a major reduction in fatalities the following year from 1148 to 986, the largest single reduction in recent Alabama history.
The Alabama Department of Public Safety and local law enforcement agencies throughout the state have long understood the relationship between death and a failure to buckle up. While they are persistent in their enforcement of state seatbelt laws, there are also some efforts that are made periodically as special reminders to the citizenry of the importance of one of their most effective traffic safety efforts.
Click It or Ticket (CIOT) is predominant among these efforts. In it, Alabama cooperates with a National Highway Traffic Safety (NHTSA) effort that is generally run each year during the months of May and June. CIOT is a high-visibility, massive enforcement effort to detect violators of Alabama's seat belt laws.
All law enforcement agencies in the state support CIOT by contributing resources to it. Federal funds are also made available through the Law Enforcement Traffic Safety Division (LETS) of the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs (ADECA), and their Community Traffic Safety (CTSP) coordinators are totally involved in coordination activities. Mobilization involves more than 1,500 safety checkpoints in every county in Alabama conducted jointly by state, county and municipal local law enforcement agencies, and this has become the largest law enforcement mobilization effort in Alabama's history. An intense public information and education campaign is run concurrently with the enforcement blitz to inform the motoring public of law enforcement's attitude of “zero tolerance” for seat belt violations.
With the annual Alabama Department of Public Health observational study showing Alabama measuring 90% seatbelt use in 2009, the campaign has been extremely successful, and so Alabama plans to continue to participate in Click It or Ticket well into the future. It is important to recognize the part that all law enforcement contributes to this leadership statistic by enforcing the primary seat belt law 24x7. However, highly publicized and aggressive enforcement campaigns like CIOT are essential to send a strong, concentrated message that it is the law that everyone must be buckled up. It also reminds everyone of how critical our seat belt laws are to saving lives, which in turn leads to greater compliance.
CAPS’ involvement in the Click it or Ticket effort is significant. CAPS coordinates overall activities, performs an evaluation of the program results by evaluating data from before and after the program, and compiles the comprehensive project report as their role in the Click It or Ticket project.
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