Crime & Safety

'Click It or Ticket' Campaign Starts Monday

Law enforcement agencies will be cracking down on seat belt scofflaws.

Buckle up.

Los Angeles county sheriff's deputies and city police officers will join other law enforcement agencies throughout the state Monday in the "Click It or Ticket" crackdown of seat belt scofflaws that will run through June 5.

Adults who are caught not wearing a seat belt face a minimum $142 fee for their first offense. The first-time fine is $445 for children under 16. The penalties apply to both unbelted drivers and passengers.

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The annual nationwide spring campaign to enforce seat belt laws will involve more than 140 local law enforcement agencies in the state, including the California Highway Patrol.

"Seat belts save thousands of lives every year," said Sergeant Bob Rieboldt of the Los Angeles Police Department's traffic coordination section. "Buckling up will not only save you a heavy fine, it can also save your life.  We're not giving warnings.  It's Click It or Ticket."

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According to the California Office of Traffic Safety, the Click It or Ticket campaign has helped increase statewide adult seat belt usage from 92.5 percent in 2005 to 96.2 percent last year, an all-time high.

“We are very proud of California’s seat belt and child safety seat use rates,” said Christopher J. Murphy, director of the state's traffic safety office. “However, with nearly 1 million motorists still not buckling up, there is much more work to do. Reaching the last 4 percent of motorists is crucial to reaching our goal of zero deaths.”

The campaign this year will prioritize enforcement at night, since that's when most vehicle occupants are not buckled up and more likely to die in crashes.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) found that 11,593 vehicle occupants died in crashes at night nationwide in 2009 and nearly two-thirds (62 percent) were not wearing seat belts, compared to 44 percent killed while not wearing seat belts during daytime crashes.

Teens between the ages of 13 and 15 had the highest percentage (67 percent) of all age groups to be killed and unrestrained in traffic crashes in 2009, according to the NHTSA.

The NHTSA reported that seat belts saved approximately 12,713 lives nationwide in 2009, including 1,365 lives in California. It estimated that 147 people in California could have survived crashes in 2009, if they had been wearing a seat belt.

The state's Click It or Ticket campaign is funded by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The Click It or Ticket campaign first started in 1993 as a statewide effort in North Carolina and it became a national event in 1997 with enforcement occurring around the Memorial Day holiday.


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