MAY 2010 “A PARTNERSHIP TO COMPLEMENT IDAHO’S STRATEGIC HIGHWAY SAFETY PLAN” ISSUE 28.1

In This Special Issue:

Welcome, Mary Hunter Opening Comments, Scott

Stokes NHTSA Comments, John Mof-

fatt Line of Duty, Sgt. Ted Piche’ Keynote Speaker - Pam Holt Overview of Traffic Enforce-

ment, Sheriff John Whetsel Workshop Descriptions and

Summaries SHSP Lane Departure Focus

Group Overview, John Perry Traffic Law Update, Jared

Olson Toward Zero Deaths Handout

Special Report

Highway Safety Summit

This newsletter is a product of the Idaho Highway Safety Coalition. To submit articles or ideas that we may consider for publication, send email

to admin@idahohighwaysafety.org

A big thank you to the 267 participants in this year’s Highway Safety Summit! The event proved to be informative and a great opportunity to collaborate and open to new ways to save lives on Idaho roads. In this special issue of Highway Safety News you will find a recap of the day as a reminder to those who attended and for those who were not able to be there in person. Thanks to all!

Welcome - Mary Hunter

Mary Hunter, Highway Safety Manager for ITD, opened the Highway Safety Summit to a room of 267 law enforcement officers, emergency medical services personnel and other safety advocates. This year Idaho saw a decline in highway fatalities and many have wondered if the cause of the decline was related to the economy. According to Mary, data does not support that hypothesis, although it is not clear what the true cause of the decline is. Idaho has been looking at Washington State’s Safety Corridors, as a possible direction to take with our safety efforts. When reviewing the data for Washington’s program, no steep decline is visible because they have been steady and pro-active for years. However, the program does seem to be effective in changing driver behavior. Idaho is committed to doing better than we have in the past, as other states are doing. Current statistics show that the cost of crashes in Idaho is $2.5 billion per year, which relates to $1,600 per Idahoan in 2009. Society pays 75% of the total crash costs and 85% of medical costs. According to a recent survey, 87% of the public know that they pay these costs through their insurance rates, higher charges at hospitals and higher taxes. The top predictable contributors to highway deaths in Idaho are single vehicle run-off-road, no seat belt, aggressive driving, impaired driving and distracted driving. Idaho’s Strategic Highway Safety Plan is looking at ways to reach the goal of “Toward Zero Deaths, Every Life Counts” by addressing these top contributors to preventable traffic fatalities and serious injuries. You can help. The logo and slogan “Toward Zero Deaths, Every Life Counts” may be used by all.

ITD’s director, Brian Ness, has challenged ITD to be the best transportation department in the

nation. According to the studies, the critical elements to reaching our goals are commitment from

top administrators, data driven decisions, partnerships and effective seat belt and impaired driving

laws. We look forward to improving our partnerships with each of you among all our other efforts

to reduce fatalities in Idaho.

Opening Comments - Scott Stokes

Scott Stokes, ITD’s Deputy Director, has become the Office of Highway Safety’s advocate at the administrative level. He shared his vision of changing the culture of driving behavior in Idaho. Scott honored those on the front lines as directly responsible for the reduction in fatalities for four straight years and working on the fifth. When Idaho saw its first dip in fatalities four years ago, the media called to find out what great things ITD had done to make that happen. The only thing they could come up with was that “perhaps there’s something changing in our culture.” To reach our goal of zero deaths, there must be a change in the way people think and what society accepts regarding driving behavior. Scott told of a thought process he had one day during lunch, while considering that 226 individuals in Idaho died, and 1,400 are seriously injured in 2009 alone. He wondered who would be affected if he suddenly died in a traffic crash. The questions Scott asked himself were:

How many immediate family members would be severely affected? How many close family members would be severely affected? How many close friends would be severely affected? How many work associates would be severely affected?

Scott came up with 140 personal friends, family and co-workers that would be significantly affected by his death. With about 220 fatalities a year, about 30,800 people would be trauma-tized by traffic deaths each year. He wondered again…

Is there any way to work this math in reverse? What if beginning today he were to talk to his immediate family members and affect

their traffic safety beliefs? What if his family, friends and work associates made safe driving choices by not driving

aggressively or distracted, not driving impaired and always buckling up while driving? What if all of us affected 140 people, or even half that number by sharing our perspec-

tive with them? What if those people each talked to five people?

Scott says, “ITD is going to turn over every stone and look for opportunities to save lives. We can outperform the nation because we have the best people involved!”

Scott Stokes, Brian Ness (ITD Director), John Moffat (NHTSA Regional Administrator)

NHTSA Comments - John Moffat

John Moffat, NHTSA Regional Administrator, spoke about the need for local efforts to reduce deaths and serious injuries. ITD, the US Dept. of Transportation, FHWA and NHTSA cannot do this work alone. They can talk about what might be done, and offer tools to use, but individuals on the front lines and in communities are the hands and feet to have safer roads. John recognized Idaho’s Law Enforcement Liaison program as a leading model for the nation. NHTSA is working to adopt Idaho’s program for all states. He also asked for support from agencies and individuals to write letters to the editor of local papers during mobilization campaigns to sup-port ITD’s efforts to reduce deaths and serious injuries. John shared that the purpose of the mobilizations is not to see how many tickets officers can write, but to keep people alive. NHTSA’s data shows that the only effective way to change behavior is a strong media message combined with a strong law enforcement campaign. The reason NHTSA focuses on seat belts and alcohol is simple. Most impaired driving crashes in-volve alcohol, either the driver’s or someone else’s, and those individuals die because they aren’t wearing seat belts. Preventing the crash is as important as wearing your seat belt to prevent death and serious injury. John encouraged law enforcement to mandate belts for their agencies and to write themselves tickets for not wearing seat belts. John voiced a special request for engineers to partner with highway safety and help on their side to

make the roads as safe as possible so when people do make mistakes, there are rumble strips to

wake them or softer shoulders to make less trauma.

Line of Duty Presentation - Sgt Ted Piche’

Sgt. Ted Piche’, Law Enforcement Liaison (LEL) Chairman, dedicated the Highway Safety Summit this year to fallen officers from across America. He reported that the fewest number of officers in 50 years died in traffic crashes during 2009. Ted encouraged law enforcement to set the example for the public by buckling up and to take op-portunities to talk to those who don’t buckle up. He said that they wouldn’t go to work without their vest on and encouraged officers not to drive without their belts on. Ted also suggested practicing how to unbuckle the seat belt quickly and dispelled the myth that wearing a belt means officers can’t get out of the car fast enough. Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) Academy partnered with TOPS training to provide cur-

riculum about cadets buckling. Kyle Wills, LEL from Boise City Police, was a valuable help in getting

the training included in the POST curriculum.

Pam Holt, Trauma Prevention Services Coordinator for St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Springfield, Missouri, talked about “The Way You Drive.” Pam said she has often listened to teenagers say “Police officers don’t buckle up…why should I?” Her presentation was directed at the officers to educate them about why they should buckle up. Listening to a trauma nurse’s perspective on injuries and deaths that happen as a result of traffic crashes puts a new spin on whether to wear a seat belt or not. Pam noted that before we go to sleep today, 119 people will die in a traffic crash. Not wearing a seat belt doesn’t cause their crash, but they die because they aren’t wearing seat belts. “People think its their right to wear a seat belt or not. Go to a trauma center…what if the Dr. says I don’t want to take care of him? What’s the difference? Who pays for you not wearing your seat belt?” Pam suggested that seat belt use should be mandated for public health. Mature drivers are more likely to buckle up. The older you are the more you realize it hurts to hit a windshield — and you wear your seat belt. One city in Missouri was frustrated with the legislature’s inactivity on passing a primary seat belt law. The city passed their own law, rather than waiting for the legislature to make a statewide law. She encouraged municipalities to make a primary seat belt law for their locale.

Pam gave very graphic descriptions of what happens in a crash from a medical perspective. She described the difference in injuries between men and women. Men and women tend to sit differently in the seat as they drive, and react differently when in a crash. She described two scenarios for unbelted occupants, many go up and over (into or through the wind-shield). She then described facial fractures and trau-matic brain injuries. Those that slump in their seats tend to go into and under the dash. Many of those injured suffer sever hip dislocations or femur frac-tures.

Pam was a powerful presenter and she has agreed to return to Idaho so we can develop a DVD to share.

Keynote Speaker - Pam Holt

Overview of Traffic Enforcement - Sheriff John Whetsel

Sheriff John Whetsel, of Oklahoma County, OK, has a unique perspective on traffic safety as an officer who arrived on the scene of a crash to find the victims were his own wife and daughter. He described the experience as a law enforcement officer arriving on the scene to provide support and then discovering the body he was holding was that of his own precious child. Sheriff Whetsel came through that traumatic experience with a mission to promote highway safety. When he ran for the office of sheriff, the current sheriff believed that writing tickets would cause people to not vote for him. In 1996 the department wrote just 16 tickets in the entire year. Sheriff Whetsel believes that if tickets aren’t written, people will be dead and not able to vote. He shared how their department looks beyond the traffic ticket to the people and their facial expressions. They use traffic stops to arrest fugitives and drug traffickers. Timothy McVeigh was apprehended in a routine traffic stop. This month they caught a rapist and 26 drug dealers. Now Oklahoma County traffic crash rate is down 97%, although the population rate has increased 505%. Sheriff Whetsel’s final comments were “Crashes are forever…the effects last forever, but we can

make a difference and save a life by doing our job. I challenge you today to do that. Save a life!”

Workshop Descriptions and Summaries

Lethal Weapon Overview

This workshop was designed to create a team-building approach between prosecutors and police officers to aid in the detection, apprehension and prosecution of vehicular crimes. Participants learned strategies of how prosecutors and crash reconstructionists can put together the best evidence in a vehicular homicide (Lethal Weapon) case.

Innovative Enforcement Techniques

The primary focus of this workshop was to educate judges and prosecutors on the effective uses of the DBC lidar. Sgt Matt Pavelek with the Nampa Police Department and Lance Martin with LTI lead this discussion.

WebCars: New Crash Analysis Tools

This class demonstrated the basic principles of the software program WebCars. WebCars is a software pro-gram available to law enforcement , engineers and planners that facilitates analysis of local crash problems and their locations.

Workshop Descriptions and Summaries, continued

Lane Departures and Intersections

These two emphasis areas have been identified as part of the Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP). John Perry from FHWA spoke about strategies that have been identified to reduce lane departure crashes. Included in this category are the single vehicle run-off-road crashes. He shared some of the new infrastructure initiatives that will be implemented as part of the Highway Safety Plan to ad-dress these types of crashes. See John’s summary on the next page to learn about the SHSP focus group and their efforts. Terry Little, of Ada County Highway District presented the intersection SHSP emphasis area strate-gies that group has identified as the most effective ways to reduce crashes in intersections and to identify high risk locations around the state.

Distracted Driving

Pam Holt, keynote speaker from the morning session, spoke about what is happening on a national scale regarding distracted driving. She also talked about better awareness of our own distracted driving, and how we can all learn to make better driving decisions.

The ALS Process: What LE Agencies and Prosecutors Should Know

This workshop was about the due process requirements of Idaho Code §18-8002A and how those may conflict with law enforcement and prosecutors concerns in the pending criminal matter. Spe-cifically discussed was subpoenas for officers and subpoenas for evidence.

Road Safety Audits

RSA’s are formal safety performance examinations of an existing or future road/intersection by an independent and multidisciplinary team. This was a great opportunity to learn about the principal components of a Road Safety Audit, the importance and benefits of this type of audit, and success-ful implementation of improvements.

Crash Reconstuction & Blackbox - CDR

There were two components to this workshop. The first half hour was be about Crash Reconstruc-tion. The presenter spoke about the different types of equipment available to crash reconstruc-tionists. There was a display with the different pieces of equipment used during a crash reconstruc-tion. Trooper Carmack discussed the resources available to city and county law enforcement agencies as well as county prosecutors. In the second part of this workshop, an iSP crash reconstructionist with ISP spoke about the Crash Data Retrieval system, also referred to as the Blackbox recorder.

SHSP Lane Departure Emphasis Area Overview

John Perry of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) gave a brief overview of how the Stra-tegic Highway Safety Plan’s Lane Departure Team came together and how the initial strategies and action plan items were developed. He gave an overview of his team members and briefly mentioned the SHSP’s 11 Emphasis Areas before concentrating on the Lane Departure Strategies and Action Plan items. John presented the focus group’s strategies which included Rumble Strips, Enforcement, Training, Roadway Visibility, Clear Zones and Shoulder Widening. John noted that the overall plan for engi-neering related strategies was to collect and analyze the data, and prepare a prioritized list of pro-jects needed to fill in the gaps to assist in reducing the number of run off the road crashes. It was noted that a University of Idaho report is due out soon that should help in these efforts. Best prac-tices are scheduled to be shared with the public via the LHTAC/T2 Center Monthly Newsletter. The team is also focusing on increasing communications between law enforcement, ITD traffic engineers, and local highway agencies. Road safety audit and highway safety manual training are scheduled for delivery this year and should help to raise awareness towards these various focus areas. John also noted that a FY11 Research Study for fifty thousand dollars was recently ap-proved and will be completed regarding the “Study of Media Messages and Tools to Reduce Single Vehicle Run-Off-Road Crashes”. John noted that various law enforcement agencies, public works, highway districts, and ITD traffic engineers participated in the Ada and Canyon County Safety Survey. The questions focused on providing problematic locations for run off the road crashes, suggested improvements, communi-cation protocols between agencies for reducing single vehicle run-off-road crashes, and any best practices for sharing with other agencies. The survey questions were then distributed to session attendees asking for immediate feedback. Based on the feedback gathered thus far, the Lane De-parture Team plans to share the survey questions at the statewide level.

Traffic Law Update

The Highway Safety Summit ended with a presentation from Jared Olson on traffic law. Jared Olson is Idaho’s Traffic Safety Resource Prosecutor (TSRP). He acts as a liaison between prosecutors, judiciary, law enforcement and others in the fight against impaired driving. Previ-ously, Jared worked as the Asst. Chief Deputy for the Bannock County Prosecutor’s office, han-dling all drug and felony DUIs in the county. Jared shared a couple of case law incidents that relate to prosecution of impaired drivers. He noted that in State vs Wheeler, the main concern was whether the police officer’s vehicle was a sterile enough setting to draw blood. Jared brought forward evidence proving that the most un-sterile setting is actually the hospital itself. Blood may be drawn by trained officers in their patrol cars in a “medically acceptable manner.”

Laminated Handout from ITD’s Office of Highway Safety

Laminated Handout from ITD’s Office of Highway Safety, pg 2