This week through Labor Day, state police will join more than 250 local police departments and county sheriff’s offices to step up enforcement with roadside safety checks and hundreds of additional hours of drunk and drugged driving patrols.
According to a news release, Illinois has experienced improvements in the past decade with drunk and drugged driving fatalities, but impaired drivers still play a role in more than 300 highway deaths and hundreds more serious injuries every year.
The release cites estimates from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. It finds 475 traffic crash fatalities involved an alcohol-impaired driver in 2004 in Illinois. That number dropped to a low of 278 in 2011. However, 322 drunk driving deaths occurred in Illinois in 2012 and 2013.
The Labor Day crackdown is part of the “Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over” and “Click It or Ticket” programs in Illinois, funded with federal traffic safety dollars and administered by IDOT.