The 2006 spike in alcohol-related traffic deaths means a crackdown in Howard County.
“There were 547 homicides statewide last year and 651 traffic deaths,” said Vernon Betkey, Jr., chief of the Maryland Highway Safety Office.
“It doesn?t get the same attention.”
Labor Day is the third-deadliest U.S. holiday for drunken driving, and Howard police are preparing with checkpoints and saturation patrols.
“Checkpoints are so big and dramatic that they attract attention,” Howard Police Chief William McMahon said.
“People tell their friends about it, and there is a multiplying effect on public awareness.”
The holiday patrol for drunken drivers is part of a half-million-dollar Checkpoint Strikeforce campaign, which aims to reduce drunken driving statewide. Sobriety checkpoints can reduce alcohol-related crashes by 20 percent, according to an Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study.
The campaign was kicked off Wednesday at the Howard County Detention Center, where most drunken drivers are taken after being arrested, and included sobering tours of the booking and lock-up process.
“Even if you have every confidence in yourself not to drink and drive, that confidence doesn?t extend to the next driver,” said Kurt Erickson, president of the Washington Regional Alcohol Program.
“I could bore you with don?t drink and drive, but what I want to tell people is buckle up. It?s your best defense.”
The holiday falls at the end of the summer and usually involves parties, sports events and interstate travel, which increase the dangers of traffic collisions, police said.
Maryland saw a 17 percent increase in alcohol-related traffic fatalities this year, and police arrested more than 25,000 people for driving under the influence.
“We call them collisions and not accidents, because they have a cause and don?t just happen out of the blue,” McMahon said.
“They are preventable. People have choices to make and they can kill themselves or someone else.”
