Dalton Police Department Recognized For Traffic Safety Enforcement And Education

  • Thursday, July 30, 2015

The Dalton Police Department is being recognized for having one of the best traffic safety enforcement and education programs in the country.  The International Association of Chiefs of Police awarded the department third place honors among similar sized agencies in its annual Law Enforcement Challenge. The IACP also gave Dalton a special award for having the best distracted driving campaign in the country. 

The Law Enforcement Challenge is an annual competition of law enforcement agencies focusing on traffic safety issues such as occupant safety, speed, and impaired driving.

Departments’ efforts are graded by a panel of judges on criteria such as problem identification, policies, officer training, public education, enforcement, and the outcomes achieved by their efforts.  The DPD earned third place honors among municipal police departments with between 76 and 250 officers. 

“This is a great example of the Traffic Enforcement Unit, and the patrol division as a whole, working toward a common goal,” said DPD Chief Jason Parker. “Their approach was creative, and had positive results. Our officers deserve all the credit for this recognition, and they definitely earned it.” 

Throughout 2014, the department’s Traffic Unit and patrol officers participated in a number of efforts to increase seat belt usage, target speeders and impaired drivers in high crash areas, and also started a special initiative to address distracted driving in Dalton.  In addition to joining nationwide efforts like “Click It Or Ticket” and “Operation Zero Tolerance”, the department also staged a number of homegrown enforcement efforts. 

One such effort was “Operation Thumbs Up”, a month-long effort in October to reduce distracted driving. The DPD chose to target distracted driving after a survey of Dalton residents found respondents considered distracted driving to be the biggest public safety issue in town. In addition to a public education campaign using both traditional and social media, officers also performed targeted patrols in areas that experience a high number of crashes such as West Walnut Avenue looking not just for motorists texting and driving but also other distracted driving behaviors. Officers focused on issuing warnings and not citations, educating drivers about the risks of driving while not focusing on the road ahead.  During 2014, more than 1,900 drivers and students were contacted by officers regarding distracted driving, with nearly 1,000 of those coming during “Operation Thumbs Up.” Distracted driving crashes went down 23.7% in 2014 compared to the year before, with injuries in such crashes being reduced by 13.5%.    

“It’s always important to pay attention to community expectations, and there is definitely a strong consensus here that distracted driving is a dangerous behavior that results in multiple crashes and injuries every year,” Chief Parker said of the Operation Thumbs Up effort. “It’s the kind of work that the average citizen may not be able to appreciate on a day-to-day basis, but when you consider the big picture, it clear this work is important.” 

In addition to the seat belt and car safety seat enforcement the department has traditionally done, the department performed nighttime studies in the summer of 2014 for the first time to measure compliance to Georgia’s seat belt laws after dark. The studies found that seat belt usage in town goes down after nightfall, just as it does nationwide.  That information led the department to conduct seat belt enforcement between the hours of 9 pm and 12 am for the first time in August 2014. Overall, a three month survey conducted by officers watching traffic in various areas around town found that seat belt usage rose during the summer months (86% in June, 89% in July, and 91% in August) in Dalton rose during the course of 2014, meeting the state average of 97% by the year’s end. 

The department’s effort to slow down speeding drivers in town was also met with positive outcomes.  The department performed 118 enforcement details focused on speed in 2014.  Overall, the agency issued 2,065 citations or warnings for speed related offenses. The city’s speed related crashes were reduced by 34.9% in 2014 compared to the previous year. Of the 1,257 crashes investigated by the DPD in 2014, only 50 included speed as a contributing factor. The DPD investigated two fatal crashes in 2014, and speed was not a factor in either one. 

“From day one, our traffic unit and patrol officers have worked toward worthwhile goals of better prevention and education,” said Chief Parker. 

The Roanoke (VA) Police Department and Roanoke County (VA) Police Department took first and second place honors in the DPD’s category. The DPD’s awards will be presented at the IACP’s annual conference in Chicago, Ill. in October. 

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