Pleasanton PD Receives Grant For Traffic Enforcement Program

Press release from Pleasanton Police Department:

The Pleasanton Police Department has been awarded a $32,500 grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS) for a year-long program of special enforcement and public awareness efforts to prevent traffic related deaths and injuries. The Pleasanton Police Department will use the funding as part of the City’s ongoing commitment to keep our roadways safe and improve the quality of life through both enforcement and education.

After falling to a ten year low in 2010, the number of fatalities on California roadways has risen to 3,540 fatalities in 2019. Particularly alarming is the rise in pedestrian and bicycle fatalities. Traffic accidents killed 455 cyclists in California from 2016 through 2018, according to new data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The figures translate to about 3.9 bike accident fatalities per million people, the highest rate over any three-year period since the mid-1990s, before many cities built extensive bike networks. This grant funding will provide opportunities to combat these issues and other devastating problems such as speeding and collisions in heavily traversed intersections.

The Pleasanton Police Department, with assistance from the Office of Traffic Safety, will use these tools to help keep Pleasanton streets safe. Specific enforcement activities that the OTS grant will fund include:

• DUI saturation patrols

• Distracted driving enforcement

• Traffic enforcement

• Collaborative traffic enforcement with allied agencies within Alameda County

While alcohol remains the worst offender for DUI crashes, the Pleasanton Police Department supports the new effort from OTS that aims to drive awareness that “DUI Doesn’t Just Mean Booze.” Prescription medications and marijuana can also be impairing by themselves, or in combination with alcohol, and can result in a DUI arrest.

Funding for this program is from the California Office of Traffic Safety through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

This press release was produced by Pleasanton Police Department. The views expressed here are the author's own.