The Sacramento Police Department has been awarded a new traffic safety grant for a year-long anti-DUI program aimed at preventing deaths and injuries on city roadways. The grant, awarded by the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS), totaled $670,500.  The Sacramento Police Department and OTS are committed to keeping our streets safe through enforcement and education.

The DUI Team will use a variety of strategies to target impaired drivers and educate the public about the dangers associated with drinking and driving including: DUI checkpoints, warrant sweeps, surveillance of repeat DUI offenders, DUI saturation patrols, and court sting operations.  Drunk driving remains one of America's deadliest crimes. In 2008, over 11,700 people died in highway crashes involving a driver or motorcycle operator with a blood alcohol content of .08 or higher.

"Last year in California, 1,029 people died in alcohol impaired crashes; a 9 percent reduction in deaths from 2007," said Christopher J. Murphy, Director of OTS. "This grant will help keep that trend going by getting drunk drivers off the roadways of the city of Sacramento."

In addition to the enforcement operations already listed, the DUI Enforcement Team will be conducting two special Motorcycle Safety Enforcement Operations. Motorcycle fatalities have been on the rise in California, increasing 175 percent statewide in the last decade. In 1998, 204 people were killed, and in 2008 there were 560 riders killed in motorcycle crashes.

The DUI Enforcement Team will be patrolling areas frequented by motorcycles and will conduct strict enforcement of all traffic violations to reduce the number of motorcycle collisions, injuries, and deaths.

Funding for all of these operations is made possible by OTS through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.