From Deseret News archives:

Utah's drop in DUI deaths best in U.S.

Published: Thursday, Aug. 17, 2006 10:24 a.m. MDT
 |  E-MAIL | PRINT | FONT + - 
ROCKVILLE, Md. — Utah led the nation in reducing DUI-related deaths last year, even as national statistics show motorists between 21 and 34 are continuing to drink and drive more than those in any other age group.

Federal officials on Wednesday announced an ad campaign aimed at sobering up young drivers with the threat of prison and an unprecedented crackdown on drunken drivers through the Labor Day weekend.

Sgt. Ted Tingey with the Utah Highway Patrol, said the long weekend is one of two of the most popular drinking holidays, with Memorial Day being the other. The UHP, along with other state and local agencies, will begin cracking down on impaired drivers Friday with a saturation blitz. Efforts will continue through Labor Day with a few roadblock checkpoints scheduled within the next two weeks.

"We'd love to go out there and come away with nothing, but I'm sure we won't see that unless we change our habits and behaviors," Tingey said.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA, took out radio and television ads that began airing Wednesday in English and Spanish on programs that appeal to 21- to 34-year-olds.

"People get so used to hearing it, they just don't worry about it anymore," Tingey said. The new campaign, he said will "kick it into high gear."

Story continues below
The cause for alarm: Nearly half the country's 11,921 motorists found last year to have a blood alcohol content of .08 or higher were between 21 and 34, NHTSA statistics show.

"That particular demographic is more at risk," said Nicole Nason, NHTSA's administrator, after announcing the campaign at a suburban Washington police academy. "They have a higher likelihood, or frequency, to drink and drive. They're also the least likely to wear their seat belts, the most likely to speed. So it's a target demographic that we really want to go after."

Coinciding with the ads, 11,000 law enforcement agencies will conduct sobriety checks and go on roving patrols until summer's end in what authorities say will be an unprecedented effort to get drunken drivers off the nation's roads.

Previous public-awareness campaigns urged people not to drink and drive and to prevent their friends from getting behind the wheel while intoxicated. But they didn't put a dent in the problem — alcohol-related traffic fatalities have remained virtually unchanged in a decade, Nason said. That's why the Bush administration decided to launch a punchier campaign, for which NHTSA has committed $11 million.

Comments

You can be the first to comment on this story.

Image
Associated Press

previousnext

Latest comments

The more people there are helping the less supervised the children present...

Harpring's NBA career is over

Thanks for the passion and intensity you brought to the court day-in and...

Sloan, comeon, we're talking about the same guy that gave jarron collins...

Those Jazz teams in the early eighties must have had a horrible record in...

I love this story! I was terrified as snakes as a child. Mainly, because I...

I have to admit. I am glad it died. The article makes light of the fact that...

Why is Y. ignoring spew of hatred?

are guilty of hate themselves.

I still have my green Jazz jacket that I will wear to the game when the Jazz...

just wait a day

@cl, I'm with you, it would be nice to see feztheb and miles play up to...

Advertisements