Arizona police agencies promote seat-belt safety

Police agencies throughout Arizona are preparing to launch a two-week seat belt initiative to save lives and will call for an increase of police presence on the roads, officials said.

Starting Monday through June 3, police will add more officers on the road with funding from the Arizona Governor’s Office of Highway Safety, allowing officers to focus on traffic enforcement and related seat belt and child safety seat usage.

Along with each agency’s regular patrol budget and overtime, approximately $200,000 in additional state funds obtained from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will be divided among 19 agencies to help pay for additional police patrols during the period, said Alberto Gutier, director of the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety.

In Arizona, drivers can be ticketed for not wearing a seat belt as a secondary violation if they are stopped for something else. However, failure to property secure a child under 5 can be the primary reason for a stop and subsequent ticket.

“As a driver, if you’re not wearing a seat belt, and you have not broken any other traffic laws, I can’t pull you over,” Gutier said. “If we pull you over for speeding, changing lanes and not signaling or missing lights, all types of traffic statutes that are in the book, then I can pull you over and give you a (seat belt) citation.”

The “Click It or Ticket” campaign has been conducted annually for more than 20 years, he said.

Many Phoenix-area police departments will participate in the stepped up enforcement.

“The reality is this is for the safety of everybody,” said Sgt. Tim Klarkowski, spokesman for the Surprise Police Department. “This is something that we have the statistics and the science to prove that seat belts work, that’s why we have laws for them and people should know when they need to wear their seat belts and they should wear them.”

Gutier said speeding or reckless driving are the top reasons for traffic fatalities, followed by impairment. Next in line is the lack of seat belt use, he said.

Klarkowski said the extra funds will make a difference.

“It gets additional officers on the road out there doing traffic enforcement and looking specifically for those violations,” Klarkowski said. “We’ll have a little bit more dedicated traffic enforcement presence compared to other days.”

In addition to the two-week initiative, an added push will take place Monday, the first day of the program, as Arizona joins police from across the country in what’s billed as a “Border to Border” seat belt enforcement day.

“No one likes to get pulled over, no one likes to get a citation,” Gutier said. “It’s a reminder, it’s a campaign for people to wear your seat belts, make it a habit.”