Alabama is cracking down on unsafe driving.
Each year, states get money from the National Highway Safety Bureau that is distributed throughout the states, and Gov. Bob Riley has delegated grant money to counties across the state to support highway safety.
These grants are used for campaigns such as "Click It or Ticket" and "Over the Limit. Under Arrest."
"We want people to be aware of driving safely and the consequences if you don't," said Scott Moore, a highway safety coordinator for central Alabama. "We want to make sure people are buckling up, and we want to keep the roadway safe for all of us."
These campaigns take place during holidays and busy travel weekends, said Mike Presley, of the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs.
Riley awarded $4.1 million of grants to highway safety offices across Alabama. There are nine of these offices located in different sections of the state.
Lee County is grouped with eight other counties in Alabama. Autauga, Bullock, Elmore, Lee, Lowndes, Macon, Montgomery and Russell counties split the $126,040 grant money.
The grant is set aside for campaigns taking place during the next 12 months.
Moore said grants like these are used for sustained enforcement of safe driving and covers the eight counties from Oct. 1 to Sept. 31 each year.
The amount of money each county receives is based on information gathered from software developed at the University of Alabama.
Rhonda Strickland, a spokeswoman at the CARE Research and Development Laboratory, said Critical Analysis Reporting Environment, or CARE software, analyzes databases for crash information.
The Highway Safety Department looks at areas more prone to accidents, injuries and fatalities caused by drunken driving and delegates grant money accordingly.
The population of each of the nine highway safety centers is also taken into consideration, Presley said.
"Over the Limit. Under Arrest" is a campaign aimed at drunken driving.
Officers throughout the state worked overtime during the Labor Day weekend and the weeks preceding it to catch drivers under the influence.
Will Mathews of the Auburn Police Department said local police in each county reported that the times around holidays more impaired drivers were pulled over.
Mathews said Auburn police have problems with reckless driving Wednesday through Saturday.
From Aug. 21 to Sept. 7, officers looked for drivers exhibiting behavior associated with drunken driving.
Signs of drunken driving included vehicles meandering from lane to lane, following too close to other cars or unlit headlights.
Mathews said these are things sober drivers don't normally think about.
Alabama received the funding for these grants in July.
Money from the grants goes toward paying officers overtime during the campaigns, education programs and equipment for local departments.
It also goes toward education. Police departments around the state are working to educate drivers and future drivers the importance of wearing seat belts and the severity of drunken driving.
All of the officers said they hope to enforce the importance of driving safely.
Since the campaigns started, the amount of people wearing seat belts has gone up, and there has been a reduction in impaired driving.
"The purpose of the campaigns is to raise awareness and to send the message that traffic safety is serious," Presley said.
"Over the Limit. Under Arrest" and campaigns like it will continue in the future since there is growing concern about texting while driving, and legislators have been talking about doing something about that with the grant money for road safety, Moore said.
While the number of DUI arrests has been higher during the campaigns, the number of arrests has decreased.
"There were more officers on the road looking for DUIs, so there were more arrests during the program," Mathews said.
From 20 arrests the last week of the campaign to four arrests the week after, Mathews said drivers are now paying attention as officers crack down.
Auburn police want people to know that drinking and driving doesn't just put you at risk, but others as well, Mathews said.
"Consequences of injuries when driving drunk are secondary thoughts," Mathews said. "If you don't care about yourself, care about your neighbor."
Do you like this story? The Plainsman doesn't accept money from tuition or student fees, and we don't charge a subscription fee. But you can donate to support The Plainsman.
