DUI Checkpoints in 9 Bay Area Cities Friday

DUI checkpoints will be in place in a number of Bay Area communities tonight, including San Francisco, Burlingame, East Palo Alto, El Cerrito, Martinez, Morgan Hill, Petaluma, Redwood City and Santa Clara, as well as in Monterey County.

Officers will staff most checkpoints beginning at 7 p.m. in an ongoing effort to keep impaired drivers off of the streets.

In El Cerrito, where police arrested at least 10 people on suspicion of DUI last weekend alone, officers will be equipped with hand-held breath-testing devices and will stop vehicles to check drivers for both drug and alcohol impairment, according to police. 

"Each holiday season, members of our community are needlessly maimed and killed on California roadways," said El Cerrito police Sgt. Shawn Maples. "Our goal is to ensure the safe passage of each and every motorist by targeting areas where there is a high frequency of drunk drivers."

Funding for the DUI checkpoints comes from the California Office of Traffic Safety, via the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Anyone who spots a suspected drunken driver is encouraged to call 911. 

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