IMPAIRED DRIVING
 

West Virginia, in cooperation with its political subdivisions, will have a comprehensive program to combat impaired driving. This guideline describes the areas that each sub-grantee should address. Throughout this guideline, "impaired driving" means operating any motor vehicle while one's faculties are affected by alcohol or other drugs, medications, or other substances. "Impaired driving" includes, but is not limited to, impairment as defined in the West Virginia State Code.
 

Each sub-grantee should have prevention programs to reduce impaired driving through approaches commonly associated with public health -- altering social norms, changing risky or dangerous behaviors, and creating protective environments. Prevention and public health programs promote activities to educate the public on the effects of alcohol and other drugs, limit alcohol and drug availability, and prevent those impaired by alcohol and drugs from driving. Prevention programs are typically carried out in schools, work sites, medical and health care facilities, and community groups. Each sub-grantee should implement a system of impaired driving prevention activities and work with the traffic safety, health and medical communities to foster health and reduce traffic-related injuries and their resulting costs.
 

• Have a plan, program, and coordinator for all impaired driving PI&E activities;

• Develop their own PI&E campaigns and materials, either by adapting materials, or by creating new campaigns and materials;

• Encourage and support communities to implement awareness programs at the local level;

• Encourage businesses and private organizations to participate in impaired driving PI&E campaigns; and

• Implement K-12 traffic safety education, with appropriate emphasis on impaired driving, as part of a comprehensive health education program;

• Establish and support student safety clubs and activities and create a statewide network linking these groups;

• Establish liaisons with higher education institutions to encourage policies to reduce alcohol, other drug, and traffic safety problems on college campuses;

• Promote alcohol and drug free events throughout the school year, with particular emphasis on high-risk times such as prom, spring break, and graduation;

• Coordinate closely with anti-drug education efforts and programs;

• Develop working relationships with school health personnel as a means of providing information to students about a variety of traffic safety and health behaviors; and

• Make effective use of criminal justice, medical or other professionals through presentations in the classroom or assembly programs.

• Model policies for impaired driving and other traffic safety issues, including safety belt use and speeding;

• Management training to recognize and address alcohol and drug impairment;

• Education and treatment programs for employees; and

• Employee awareness activities.

• Implement and enforce programs to eliminate the sale or service of alcoholic beverages to those under 21 years of age;

• Promote alcohol server and service programs, including assessments, written policies, and training;

• Ensure adequate alcohol control programs dealing with issues such as service to visibly intoxicated patrons and the elimination of "happy hours" during which free or reduced- price alcoholic beverages are offered (food and non-alcoholic beverages may be offered instead during such times);

• Provide adequate resources to enforce alcohol beverage control regulations;

• Promote the display of responsible alcohol use and drinking and driving information in alcohol sales and service establishments;

• Promote participation in designated driver, safe rides, and other alternative transportation programs; and

• Provide information that commercial establishments may be held responsible for damages caused by any patron who was served alcohol when visibly intoxicated.

• Designated drivers; and Safe rides.

Each sub-grantee should implement a system of activities to deter impaired driving. The deterrence system should include public information and education, enforcement, prosecution, adjudication, criminal sanctions, driver licensing, and vehicle registration activities. The goal should be to increase the perception and probability of arrest for violators and the imposition of swift and sure sanctions.
 

• Comprehensive;

• Seasonally focused; and Sustained.

• Give impaired driving cases high priority for prosecution;

• Provide sufficient resources to prosecute cases presented by law enforcement efforts;

• Facilitate uniformity and consistency in prosecution of impaired driving cases;

• Provide training for prosecutors so they can obtain high rates of conviction and seek appropriate sanctions for offenders;

• Encourage vigorous prosecution of alcohol-related fatality and injury cases under both impaired driving and general criminal statutes; and
   
• Ensure that prosecutors are knowledgeable and prepared to prosecute youthful offenders appropriately.

D. Adjudication

Many first-time impaired driving offenders and most repeat offenders have substantial substance abuse problems that affect their entire lives, not just their driving. They have been neither prevented nor deterred from impaired driving. Each Sub-grantee should implement a system to identify and refer these drivers to appropriate substance abuse treatment programs to change their dangerous behavior.
 

• Be conducted by qualified personnel prior to sentencing; and
   
• Be used to decide whether a substance abuse treatment program should be part of the sanctions imposed.

• Ensure that those referred for impaired driving offenses are not permitted to drive again until their substance abuse problems are under control;

• Be conducted in addition to, not as a substitute for, license restrictions and other sanctions; and
   

• Be conducted separately for youth.

Good program management produces effective programs. Planning and coordination are especially important for impaired driving activities, since many different parties are involved. Each Sub-grantee's impaired driving program management system should have an established process for managing its planning (including problem identification), program control, and evaluation activities. The system should provide for a local task forces and data analysis. It also should include planning and coordination of activities with other agencies involved in impaired driving programs and expansion of existing partnerships, such as with the health and medical communities.
 

• Be based on careful problem definition that makes use of crash and driver record data; and
   
• Direct community resources toward effective measures that address impaired driving issues.

• Detect and correct problems quickly;

• Measure progress in achieving established goals and objectives; and
   
• Ensure that appropriate data are collected for evaluation.

• Use these groups to bring a wide variety of interests and resources to bear on impaired driving issues;

• Ensure that Federal, State, and local organizations coordinate impaired driving activities, so that the activities complement rather than compete with each other; and
   
• Ensure that these groups include traditional and non-traditional partners, such as law enforcement, local government, business, education, community groups, health, medicine, prosecutors and judges.

• Accurate;

• Timely;

• Able to be linked to each other; and
   
• Readily accessible to police, courts, and planners.

• Designed to use available traffic records and other injury control data systems effectively;

• Included in initial program planning to ensure that appropriate data are available and that adequate resources are allocated; and

• Conducted regularly.

• Reported regularly to project and program managers; and
   
• Used to guide further program activities.

OCCUPANT PROTECTION
 

West Virginia, in cooperation with its political subdivisions, will have a comprehensive occupant protection program that educates and motivates its citizens to use available motor vehicle occupant protection systems. A combination of use requirements, enforcement, public information, education, and incentives is necessary to achieve significant, lasting increases in safety belt usage, which will prevent fatalities and control the number and severity of injuries. Therefore, a well-balanced State occupant protection program will include the components described below.
 

• Provide leadership, training, and technical assistance to other agencies and local occupant protection programs and projects;

• Convene an occupant protection advisory task force or coalition to organize and generate broad-based support for programs;

• Integrate occupant protection programs into community/corridor traffic safety and other injury prevention programs; and
   
• Evaluate the effectiveness of its occupant protection program.

• Require all motor vehicle occupants to use the systems provided by the vehicle manufacturer and educational programs to explain their benefits and the correct way to use them;

• Require children up to 40 pounds to ride in a safety device certified by the manufacturer to meet all applicable Federal performance standards;

• Require employees of all levels of government to wear safety belts when traveling on official business;
   
• Require that organizations receiving Federal highway safety program grant funds have and enforce an employee safety belt use policy; and

• Written, enforced belt use policies for law enforcement agencies with sanctions for noncompliance to protect law enforcement officers from harm and for officers to serve as role models for the motoring public;

• Vigorous enforcement of public safety belt use and child safety seat laws, including citations and warnings;

• Accurate reporting of occupant protection system information on accident report forms, including use or non-use of belts or child safety seats, type of belt, and presence of and deployment of air bag;

• Public information and education (PI&E) campaigns to inform the public about occupant protection laws and related enforcement activities;

• Routine monitoring of citation rates for non-use of safety belts and child safety seats; and
   
• Certification of an occupant protection training course for both basic and in-service training by the Police (or Peace) Officer Standards and Training (POST) board.

• Identify and target specific audiences, (e.g., low-use, high risk motorists) and develop messages appropriate for these audiences;

• Address the enforcement of the State's belt use and child passenger safety laws; the safety benefits of regular, correct safety belt (both manual and automatic) and child safety seat use; and the additional protection provided by air bags;

• Capitalize on special events, such as nationally recognized safety and injury prevention weeks and local enforcement campaigns;

• Coordinate different materials and media campaigns where practicable, (e.g., by using a common theme and logo);

• Use national themes and materials to the fullest extent possible;

• Publicize belt-use surveys and other relevant statistics;

• Encourage news media to report belt use and non-use in motor vehicle crashes;

• Involve media representatives in planning and disseminating public information campaigns;

• Encourage private sector groups to incorporate belt-use messages into their media campaigns;

• Take advantage of all media outlets: television, radio, print, signs, billboards, theaters, sports events, health fairs; and
   
• Evaluate all media campaign efforts

• Integrate occupant protection into professional health training curricula and comprehensive public health planning;

• Promote occupant protection systems as a health promotion/injury prevention measure;

• Require public health and medical personnel to use available motor vehicle occupant protection systems when on the job;
   
• Provide technical assistance and education about the importance of motor vehicle occupant protection to primary caregivers, (e.g., doctors, nurses, clinic staff);

• Include questions about safety belt use in health risk appraisals;

• Utilize health care providers as visible public spokespersons for belt use and child safety seat use;

• Provide information about availability of child safety seats through maternity hospitals and other pre-natal and natal care centers; and
   
• Collect, analyze, and publicize data on additional injuries and medical expenses resulting from non-use of occupant protection devices.

• Educate parents, pediatricians, hospitals, law enforcement, EMS and the general public about the safety risks to small children, the benefits of child safety seats, and their responsibilities for compliance with child passenger safety laws;

• Ensure that highway safety and traffic-related injury control in general, and occupant protection in particular, are included in local health and safety education curricula;

• Establish and enforce written policies requiring that school employees operating a motor vehicle on the job use safety belts; and
   
• Encourage active promotion of regular safety belt use through classroom and extra-curricular activities as well as in the school-based health clinics.

• Establish and enforce a safety belt use policy with sanctions; and
   
• Conduct occupant protection education programs for employees on their belt use policies and the safety benefits of motor vehicle occupant protection.

• Establish a coalition or task force of individuals and organizations to actively promote use of occupant protection systems;

• Create an effective communications network among coalition members to keep members informed; and
   
• Provide materials and resources necessary to conduct occupant protection education programs, especially directed toward young people, in local settings.

• Conduct and publicize at least two observational surveys of safety belt and child safety seat use annually, making every effort to ensure that it meets applicable federal guidelines;

• Maintain trend data on child safety seat use, safety belt use, and air bag deployment in fatal crashes;

• Identify target populations through observational surveys and crash statistics;

• Conduct and publicize statewide surveys of public knowledge and attitudes about occupant protection laws and systems;

• Obtain monthly or quarterly data from law enforcement agencies on the number of safety belt and child passenger safety citations and convictions;

• Evaluate the use of program resources and the effectiveness of existing general public and target population education programs;

• Obtain data on morbidity as well as the estimated cost of crashes, compare on the basis of safety belt usage and non-usage; and
   
• Ensure that evaluation results are an integral part of new program planning and problem identification.

POLICE TRAFFIC SERVICES
 

West Virginia, in cooperation with its political subdivisions, will have an efficient and effective police traffic services (PTS) program to enforce traffic laws, prevent crashes and their resulting deaths and injuries, assist the injured, document specific details of individual crashes, supervise crash clean-up, and restore safe and orderly movement of traffic. PTS is critical to the success of most traffic safety countermeasures and to the prevention of traffic-related injuries. Traffic law enforcement plays an important role in deterring impaired driving involving alcohol or other drugs, achieving safety belt use, encouraging compliance with speed laws, and reducing other unsafe driving actions. Experience has shown that a combination of highly visible enforcement, public information, education, and training is necessary to achieve a significant and lasting impact in reducing crashes, injuries, and fatalities. At a minimum, a well-balanced statewide PTS program should be made up of the components detailed below.
 

1. Planning and Coordination

• Provide leadership, training, and technical assistance to State, county and local law enforcement agencies;

• Generate broad-based support for enforcement programs; and

• Integrate PTS into community/corridor traffic safety and other injury prevention programs.

• Provide the public with a high quality, effective PTS system and have enabling legislation and regulations in place to implement PTS functions;

• Develop a cooperative working relationship with other local, county, and State governmental agencies and community organizations on traffic safety issues;

• Issue and enforce policies on roadside sobriety checkpoints, safety belt use, pursuit driving, crash investigating and reporting, speed enforcement, and serious traffic violations; and
   
• Develop performance measures for PTS that are both qualitative and quantitative.

• Conduct periodic assessments of service demands and resources to meet identified needs;

• Develop a comprehensive resource management plan, including a specific traffic enforcement and safety component;

• Define the plan in terms of budget requirements and services to be provided; and
   
• Develop and implement operational policies for the deployment of resources to address program demands and to meet agency goals.

• Accurate problem identification;

• Countermeasures designed to address specific problems;

• Enforcement actions applied at appropriate times and places, coupled with a public information effort designed to make the motoring public aware of the problem and the planned enforcement action; and
   
• A system to document and publicize results.

1. Necessity of Public Information and Education

• Identifies and targets specific audiences;

• Addresses enforcement of safety belt use and child passenger safety, impaired driving involving alcohol or other drugs, speed, and other serious traffic laws;

• Capitalizes on special events, such as Click It or Ticket, Operation C.A.R.E., Child Passenger Safety Awareness, Buckle Up, America! and Drunk and Drugged Driving Awareness campaigns;

• Identifies and supports the efforts of traffic safety activist groups and the health and medical community to gain increased support of and attention to traffic safety and enforcement;

• Uses national themes, events, and materials; and

• Motivates the public to support increased enforcement of traffic laws.

1. Development of public information and education functions by law enforcement agencies:

• Educate and remind the public about traffic laws and safe driving behavior;

• Disseminate information to the public about agency activities and accomplishments;

• Enhance relationships with news media and the health and medical community;

• Provide safety education and community services;

• Provide legislative and judicial information and support; and

• Increase the public's understanding of the enforcement agency's role in traffic safety.

• Disseminate information about internal activities to sworn and civilian members of the agency;

• Enhance the agency's safety enforcement role and increase employee understanding and support; and
   
• Recognize employee achievements.

• Prepare officers to act decisively and correctly;

• Increase compliance with agency enforcement goals;

• Assist in meeting priorities;

• Improve compliance with established policies;

• Result in greater productivity and effectiveness;

• Foster cooperation and unity of purpose;

• Help offset liability actions; and

• Motivate and enhance officer professionalism.

• Periodically assess enforcement activities to determine training needs;

• Require traffic enforcement knowledge and skills in all recruits;

• Provide traffic enforcement in-service training to experienced officers;

• Provide specialized CMV in-service training to traffic enforcement officers;

• Conduct training to implement specialized traffic enforcement skills, techniques, or programs; and

• Train instructors, to increase agency capabilities and to ensure continuity of specialized enforcement skills and techniques.

• Include evaluation in initial program planning efforts to ensure that data will be available and that sufficient resources will be allocated;

• Report results regularly to project and program managers, to police field commanders and officers, and to the public and private sectors;

• Use results to guide future activities and to assist in justifying resources to legislative bodies;

• Conduct a variety of surveys to assist in determining program effectiveness, such as roadside sobriety surveys, speed surveys, license checks, belt use surveys, and surveys measuring public knowledge and attitudes about traffic enforcement programs;

• Evaluate the effectiveness of services provided in support of priority traffic safety areas; and
   
• Maintain and report traffic data to the International Association of Chiefs of Police Traffic Data Report and other appropriate repositories, such as the FBI Uniform Crime Report, FHWA's SAFETY NET system, and annual statewide reports.

TRAFFIC RECORDS
 

West Virginia, in cooperation with its political subdivisions, will establish and implement a complete and comprehensive traffic records program. The Statewide program will include, or provide for, data for the entire State. A complete and comprehensive traffic records program is essential for the development and operation of a viable Safety Management System and effective traffic-related injury control efforts. It is also essential for the performance of planning, problem identification, operational management and control, tracking of safety trends, and the implementation and evaluation of highway safety countermeasures and activities. It is the essential ingredient to safety effectiveness and management.
 

• A Crash File with data on the time, environment, and circumstances of a crash; identification of the vehicles, drivers, cyclists, occupants, and pedestrians involved; and documentation of crash consequences (fatalities, injuries, property damage and violations charged) with the data tied to a location reference system;

• A Driver File or driver history record of licensed drivers in the State, with data on personal identification and driver license number, type of license, license status (suspended or revoked), driver restrictions, driver convictions for traffic violations, crash history, driver control or improvement actions, and safety education data;

• A Vehicle File with information on identification, and ownership

• A Roadway File with information about roadway location, identification, and classification as well as a description of a road's total physical characteristics, which are tied to a location reference system. This file should also contain data for normalizing purposes, such as miles of roadway and average daily traffic (ADT);

• An Emergency Medical Services (EMS) file with emergency care and victim outcome information about ambulance responses to crashes, e.g., emergency care unit, care given, injury data, and times of EMS notification and arrival; information on emergency facility and hospital care, including Trauma Registry data; and medical outcome data relative to crash victims receiving rehabilitation and for those who died as the result of the crash; and

• Provisions for file linkage through common data elements between the files or through other consistent means; performance level data as part of the traffic records system; demographic data to normalize or adjust for exposure when analyzing the various data in the files; and provisions for the use of cost data relative to amoun