NHTSA Investigating Claims that 195,000 Ford Police Cruisers are Defective

We rely on the police to provide safety for us, but it seems that lately our police are the ones in need of safety. In August, General Motors announced the recall of more than 36,000 Chevrolet Impala vehicles because of a manufacturing defect that allowed the possibility of a fracture in the front control arms. While no injuries were reported as a result of this defect, the recall did leave police departments short of vehicles, which obviously affected the officers' ability to perform their jobs. Unfortunately, it appears that the problem may not have ended with just those GM automobiles.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a new probe will determine whether or not a recall will be necessary for more than 195,000 Ford Crown Victoria police cruisers. Initial complaints have suggested that Crown Victoria police cruisers manufactured between 2005 and 2008 may have a production defect that causes the separation of the steering column from the upper intermediate shaft, as reported by the New York Daily News.

There have already been three complaints about that issue, as well as another ten complaints that the shaft had been shifting away from the steering column. The NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation has stated that the three reports of separation all occurred while the vehicles were operating at low speeds. The drivers who filed the reports claimed that the vehicles became more difficult to drive. Fortunately, no accidents have been reported.

Before the NHTSA can determine whether or not a recall is necessary, though, it must first conduct a complete investigation. According to the ODI, this consists of the following steps:

• Screening -- A preliminary review of consumer complaints and other information related to alleged defects to decide whether to open an investigation;
• Petition Analysis -- An analysis of any petitions calling for defect investigations and/or reviews of safety-related recalls;
• Investigation -- The investigation of alleged safety defects; and
• Recall Management -- Investigation of the effectiveness of safety recalls.

In the meantime, drivers who experience issues with a Crown Victoria can contact the NHTSA at (800) 424-9153.

The Century Council Launches Unique Teen Driver Safety Resource

Only in the Commonwealth of Virginia are teens and their parents required to attend a new drivers licensing ceremony conducted by a judge. It is a unique and important opportunity to underscore the fact that driving is a significant responsibility and to remind teens that driving is a privilege, not a right.

To support these efforts, The Century Council has developed the IKnowEverything program which includes a facilitator's guide for the presiding judge that pulls together current facts on teen driver safety, tips for parents and teens as they embark on the freedom of driving, a dynamic video on key safe driving messages and general resources for further information. The materials included in the facilitator's guide was developed in collaboration with the Virginia Supreme Court. 

The Century Council is spreading the word for the IKnowEverything program and we are working with the National Sheriff's Association to encourage you to use this resource in your work with teen drivers. Also, let us know what you think by visiting us on Facebook.

For more information, please visit www.iknoweverything.com.

Teen Driver Safety Programs in the U.S. and Canada Funded Project Ignition

Project Ignition, sponsored by State Farm and coordinated by the National Youth Leadership Council, provides grants for public high schools to support their students in addressing teen driver safety through service-learning. Students and teachers develop innovative service-learning projects that are intended to influence driving behaviors and save lives on the road through public awareness and engagement campaigns.

Public high schools that enroll students in grades 9-12 in the U.S. and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, New Brunswick, and Ontario are invited to apply. Twenty-five schools will be chosen to receive $2,000 grants to support the implementation of their campaigns from January to April 2013. Ten of these 25 schools will be selected to receive an additional $7,500 to continue their project in the following school year and to participate in the National Service-Learning Conference in 2014. The application deadline is November 15, 2012. Visit the Project Ignition website for the application guidelines.  www.sfprojectignition.com/

Mary A. Covillaud Elementary School fifth-graders who wrote to the mayor last spring pleading for traffic safety measures to be taken on streets around their school have since graduated.

But the legacy of their actions has inspired a new batch of civic-minded kids, say their teachers.

"They're all jazzed up," said fifth-grade teacher Pat Hogan. Hogan helped start the student council group last school year that spearheaded the letter-writing campaign.

Students have been kept abreast of city action following that effort.

The Marysville City Council is scheduled today to take up a proposal to install more stop signs at intersections currently with two-way traffic stops near the school.

A speed-activated radar sign was set up on Eighth Street following a city traffic committee meeting last month held at the school site.

The device is meant to catch the eye of motorists and urge caution near the school, where children and families frequently use the crosswalks.

"That's certainly an improvement," said Hogan.

Parents in attendance at last month's traffic committee meeting - a follow-up to the letters - had been edgy in their comments to city officials about the pedestrian hazards around Covillaud.

"That'll raise your concern really fast," said Principal Doug Escheman about the tenor of both the student letters and attendees at the meeting. "If something happened and somebody got hurt, the liability would be sitting right on the city."

Mayor Bill Harris had been quick to publicly answer the barrage of letters he received from the students, said Covillaud teacher Dale Van Liew.

"I'm really happy with his response," Van Liew said.

The city is a recent recipient of a Safe Routes to School grant, which funds the study of hazards around schools inside the city's limits.

"We could end up with blinking lights at the crosswalks and improvements at all the schools in Marysville," said Hogan.

NHTSA Releases Study on Growing Use of Alcohol Anklets to Monitor Drunk Drivers

By Alcohol Monitoring Systems, Inc.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 5, 2012 - /PRNewswire/ -- The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has released a new report, Transdermal Alcohol Monitoring: Case Studies, which takes an in-depth look at high-tech alcohol monitoring programs in six U.S. jurisdictions. The study, commissioned in 2010, was designed to evaluate the prevalence of transdermal alcohol bracelets, assess their reliability as a tool for monitoring drunk drivers and share lessons learned for programs looking to adopt the technology.

NHTSA selected six jurisdictions with large-scale use of transdermal alcohol testing technology and looked at multiple facets of each program. The jurisdictions are:

The City and County of Denver Electronic Monitoring Program

The 23rd Judicial Circuit of Jefferson County, Missouri

The Nebraska Supreme Court Office of Probation Administration

The New York 8th Judicial District Hybrid DWI Court

The North Dakota Attorney General 24/7 Sobriety Program

Wisconsin Community Services (a 501(c) 3 nonprofit that manages programs in Waukesha, Kenosha, Sheboygan, Milwaukee, Jefferson and Ozaukee counties)

According to the report, released last week, NHTSA concluded that transdermal alcohol monitors are prevalent, beneficial to courts and agencies, serve as a strong deterrent to drinking and are more effective than prior monitoring techniques, which were reported by agencies as inadequate.

According to Mike Iiams, chairman and CEO of Denver-based Alcohol Monitoring Systems, Inc., which manufactures the SCRAMx transdermal system and markets it throughout the U.S., Canada and the U.K., the case studies are part of a three-pronged approach that NHTSA generally takes to assess and evaluate technologies. "NHTSA usually begins by evaluating new technologies for reliability, moves on to a discussion of how they're applied in the courts and then takes a broader look at the lasting impact on recidivism and offender behaviors," says Iiams.

NHTSA first reported on the reliability of transdermal testing in 2005. The agency is currently conducting a SCRAMx recidivism study, slated for release in mid-2013, which will take a broad range look at recidivism data for offenders sentenced to wear SCRAMx Bracelets in South Dakota, Nebraska and Wisconsin. "The reliability of SCRAMx has been studied and reported on repeatedly since we went to market. We've now progressed to a broader look at the best ways to apply the technology in order to maximize both short-term safety and long-term impact," says Iiams.

SCRAMx has monitored 246,000 offenders since it became available to the criminal justice market in April of 2003.

According to AMS, the NHTSA case studies report looked exclusively at jurisdictions utilizing SCRAMx because their system represents the vast majority of transdermal monitors on offenders daily in the U.S., and because both their product and their delivery model have already been vetted for performance and reliability by researchers, the courts and agencies such as NHTSA. "To our knowledge we're the only company willing to submit our transdermal technology for outside, independent study," confirms Iiams. A second start-up transdermal system, which had limited use in the City and County of Denver during the time of the NHTSA study, was part of the evaluation, but the statistics were not included in much of the report's final analysis.

By Larry Copeland, USA TODAY

Texas' new highest-in-the-nation speed limit - 85 mph on a 41-mile stretch of toll road between Austin and San Antonio- could mean that other states will soon see higher speed limits, experts say.

The Texas Transportation Commission approved the new speed limit on Aug. 30; the first section of the toll road opens later this year. Rates will be set then, but will be comparable to other Central Texas toll roads. Tolls in Central Texas average 20-30 cents per mile for a full-length trip, says Steve Pustelnyk, spokesman for the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, which manages toll roads in the Austin area.

"There's a bit of an 'arms race' with speed limits, so we fully expect other states to push to increase their limits," says Jonathan Adkins, spokesman for the Governors Highway Safety Association, a non-profit group that represents the states' highway safety offices.

Other states are most likely to hike speed limits on toll roads, says Joshua Schank, president and CEO of the non-partisan Eno Center for Transportation. "That's something we're likely to see more of because federal funding for free roads is drying up," he says, meaning more states are turning to toll roads. "When you do that, it gives you the opportunity to offer premium services on those roads. Higher speeds is one way of doing that."

Schank notes that the new multiyear federal transportation funding bill passed by Congress in June significantly increases loans available to states to build toll roads.

The top speed limit in 35 states is at least 70 mph, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Texas and Utah currently are the speed kings, with 80 mph speed limits.

It isn't clear just how fast drivers will actually zip between Austin and San Antonio.

"People tend to choose a speed at which they don't think they're likely to get a ticket. In most places that's 5-10 mph over the speed limit," says Russ Rader, an Insurance Institute spokesman. "But it's hard to know when you get up to those extreme speeds what people are going to do."

News that Texas plans an 85 mph speed limit on the new toll road, which runs several miles east of Interstate 35, reignited the national debate about speeding and safety.

"An 85 mph speed limit is alarming," Adkins says. "Drivers will think they can go 90 or 95 and will be unlikely to survive a crash at that speed. Speeding continues to be the one area in highway safety where we aren't making progress."

He cites a March GHSA report showing that 10,530 people died in speeding-related crashes in the USA and Puerto Rico in 2010 - 31% of all traffic deaths. Since 2000, the share of speeding-related road deaths increased by 7% while drunken driving deaths dropped 3%. Seven states - Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia - raised speed limits on at least some roads between 2005-2012.

But John Bowman of the National Motorists Association, which advocates for higher speed limits, says it is possible to safely raise speed limits on highways - as long as engineering studies have shown that the road can handle such an increase. He points to the Ohio Turnpike, which raised the speed limit to 70 mph in the spring of 2011. It recorded the lowest fatality rate in its history that same year - six deaths.

The new Texas toll road was "designed and tested for high-speed travel," says Veronica Beyer, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Transportation. "Safety is our top priority, and tests have shown the designated speed is a safe one."

Deputy Elton Simmons' bosses knew he had a good record with the public, but they were surprised to discover just how good: not a single complaint since 1992.

By Robert Faturechi, Los Angeles Times

Along with meter maids and IRS auditors, traffic cops may be the public servants most reviled just for doing their jobs. So perhaps it's inevitable that even the best will get a few citizen complaints filed against them from time to time.

But when Los Angeles County sheriff's supervisors recently checked the numbers over the last 20 years for one of their veteran traffic cops, what they found shocked them. The number of complaints?

Zero. None. Nada.

Deputy Elton Simmons' bosses say such a record is near-impossible, that even good cops can get a few a year.

The hulking, black-booted Simmons attributes his lack of complaints to showing simple respect. "Just treat people right, give a smile," Simmons says. "It's never 'Do you know why I stopped you?' It's 'Hey, how are you doing today?'"

Simmons originally came to California as a young man to work for Hughes Aircraft, but cop shows like "CHiPs" stoked his interest in becoming a motor deputy. "You'd see it on TV and I was like 'I want to do that.'"

Now 53, his mustache graying, he's one of the department's most seasoned motor cops. For years, he's patrolled the streets of La Mirada, cracking down on bad drivers - always careful, he says, to try to make doling out the costly moving violations as pleasant as possible.

His easygoing manner was cultivated by an uncle back home in Louisiana, a pastor who instilled in Simmons the motto "Do good, be good, treat people good."

Simmons says he thinks about that mantra every time he's parked in one of his hiding spots, waiting for the next violator. "I tell the rookies, just do the right thing and you don't have to worry about too many things," he explains.

Simmons' approach, his bosses say, can keep what could be ugly moments under control. The motor cop described recently pulling over a particularly frazzled young man for speeding. "He was shaking like a leaf," Simmons recalled.

He gave the youth some time alone, meanwhile scanning his driver's license looking for small talk fodder. When Simmons returned to the car window, he changed the subject: "Your license says you're 280," he told the driver, referring to his weight. "You're not 280."

Almost immediately, the man about to be hit with a ticket was proudly telling how he'd lost 100 pounds through a strict regimen of swimming and healthy eating.

"All of a sudden the shaking is gone," Simmons said at the station the next day.

"He still got his ticket though, right?" his sergeant interrupted.

"He still got his ticket," Simmons said.

Civil, he says of his style, but never soft.

Still, even his patience is sometimes tested.

One motorist he stopped for talking on a cellphone said he had one wish for the deputy: Get hit by a car. A lot of cops, one of Simmons' bosses admitted, would have taken that remark as an invitation to tack on an extra infraction or two. Simmons chose to keep cool.

"I said, 'Well, if you're gonna make a wish, it's not gonna come true.' He's a human, I'm a human," he said.

On a recent summer day, Simmons was hiding from the sun - and passing motorists - under a shade tree along a sprawling stretch of road in La Mirada. His black boots were planted firmly on the asphalt, a sheriff's black-and-white bike steadied in between. (One fact is evident: Motor cops have to be tall or else it's hard to keep their bikes balanced while idling.)

Several motorists sped by, but Simmons waited for an especially deserving one before pulling out. It was a very nervous 19-year-old named Ismael Natera.

"I want you to slow down, OK?" Simmons warned in a fatherly way.

Maybe it was because Natera was a teenager sweaty with nerves, or maybe it was because he was late for work, but the youth got off with a warning. "I'll let you on your way," Simmons drawled.

"He cut me some slack," Natera said afterward, growing even later to work but nevertheless willing to sing Simmons' praises. "I've been pulled over before and some cops have ... different attitudes."

Simmons' next target was a woman behind the wheel of a shiny Lexus SUV.

Legs spread like stilts, leaning casually into her window, Simmons was not so forgiving this time, tagging her with a ticket that would carry a hefty fine. This driver was less inclined to praise Simmons afterward.

Capt. Patrick Maxwell said the deputy has long had a reputation at the Norwalk station as a squeaky clean mentor. But even with that, Maxwell said, he was shocked after reviewing Simmons' personnel file recently.

Maxwell confronted him: "When's the last time you had a complaint?"

"I really don't know," Simmons responded.

As it turned out, it was in 1992.

The streak without a complaint is particularly surprising because grievances arise from any number of perceived affronts, including rudeness, racism or simply on policy criticisms. And these days, complaints don't have to be made in person. They can be shot off online, making Simmons' record all the more remarkable.

His record aside, Simmons insists he is far from a pushover. He believes tickets save lives.

One woman he cited for driving without a seat belt ran into him years later. Simmons says she shook his hand and thanked him because she had been in a wreck some time later and that time had her seat belt on.

Simmons acknowledges sparing drivers who seem to be in a genuinely bad place - that teenager late to work or a frazzled woman recently who was on her cellphone because she was talking to her divorce attorney.

But for drivers who offer up phony excuses, the deputy says he's unforgiving.

Some common pleas he hears: I'm not from the area ("which doesn't mean anything"), Some car cut me off ("A lot of times drivers don't realize I've been watching; there wasn't another car") and I need to go to the bathroom ("So?"). A word to the wise, Simmons adds: Slamming on your brakes when you drive by a motor cop with a speed gun also doesn't work. The devices detect speeds from more than a football field away.

His favorite response when drivers argue is to point out they'll have their chance to plead their case in court. This isn't meant to be snarky, he says - sometimes he's wrong.

He recently pulled over a driver talking on an unusually fat phone. Though the motorist didn't argue during the stop, he did show up in court, where he explained to the judge that he had actually been talking on a Dictaphone.

When the judge asked Simmons if he was sure the device was a cellphone, the deputy admitted he wasn't. "It did look kind of thick to me," Simmons acknowledged.

The driver explained that he hadn't protested at the time because Simmons had pulled him over once before.

The cop had been so courteous, the man said, that he didn't want to cause him any trouble.

 Older drivers face confusing array of license laws

WASHINGTON - Jerry Wiseman notices it's harder to turn and check his car's blind spots at age 69 than it was at 50. So the Illinois man and his wife took a refresher driving course, hunting tips to stay safe behind the wheel for many more years - a good idea considering their state has arguably the nation's toughest older-driver laws.

More older drivers are on the road than ever before, and an Associated Press review found they face a hodgepodge of state licensing rules that reflect scientific uncertainty and public angst over a growing question: How can we tell if it's time to give up the keys?

Thirty states plus the District of Columbia have some sort of older-age requirement for driver's licenses, ranging from more vision testing to making seniors renew their licenses more frequently than younger people. At what age? That's literally all over the map. Maryland starts eye exams at 40. Shorter license renewals kick in anywhere from age 59 in Georgia to 85 in Texas.

The issue attracted new attention when a 100-year-old driver backed over a group of schoolchildren in Los Angeles late last month. That's a rarity, but with an imminent surge in senior drivers, the federal government is proposing that all states take steps to address what the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration calls "the real and growing problem of older driver safety."

Here's the conundrum: "Birthdays don't kill. Health conditions do," said Joseph Coughlin, head of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AgeLab, which develops technologies to help older people stay active.

Healthy older drivers aren't necessarily less safe than younger ones, Coughlin points out. But many older people have health issues that can impair driving, from arthritis to dementia, from slower reflexes to the use of multiple medications. There's no easy screening tool that licensing authorities can use to spot people with subtle health risks. So some states use birthdays as a proxy for more scrutiny instead.

Senior driving is a more complicated issue than headline-grabbing tragedies might suggest. Older drivers don't crash as often as younger ones. But they also drive less. About 60 percent of seniors voluntarily cut back, avoiding nighttime driving or interstates or bad weather, said David Eby of the University of Michigan's Center for Advancing Safe Transportation throughout the Lifespan.

Measure by miles driven, however, and the crash rate of older drivers begins to climb in the 70s, with a sharper jump at age 80, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Only teens and 20-somethings do worse.

That rising risk reflects the challenge for families as they try to help older loved ones stay safe but still get around for as long as possible, which itself is important for health.

The good news: Fatal crashes involving seniors have dropped over the past decade, perhaps because cars and roads are safer or they're staying a bit healthier, said the Insurance Institute's Anne McCartt.

Yet the oldest drivers, those 85 and up, still have the highest rate of deadly crashes per mile, even more than teens. More often than not, they're the victims, largely because they're too frail to survive their injuries.

And seniors are about to transform the nation's roadways. Today, nearly 34 million drivers are 65 or older. By 2030, federal estimates show there will be about 57 million - making up about a quarter of all licensed drivers. The baby boomers in particular are expected to hang onto their licenses longer, and drive more miles, than previous generations.

Specialists say more seniors need to be planning ahead like Jerry Wiseman and his wife Sandy.

"Absolutely we want to be as good drivers as we can possibly be for as long as we can," said Wiseman, of Schaumburg, Ill.

At an AARP course, Wiseman learned exercises to improve his flexibility for checking those blind spots. He takes extra care with left-hand turns, which become riskier as the ability to judge speed and distance wanes with age. He knows to watch for other changes.

"We'll be ready when it's time for one of us to stop," he said.

___

Where you live determines what extra requirements, if any, older adults must meet to keep their driver's license.

Among the most strict rules: Illinois requires a road test to check driving skills with every license renewal starting at age 75 - and starting at age 81, those renewals are required every two years instead of every four. At 87, Illinois drivers must renew annually.

In Washington, D.C., starting at age 70, drivers must bring a doctor's certification that they're still OK to drive every time they renew their license.

New Mexico requires annual renewals at 75.

Geographic variability makes little sense, said Jake Nelson, AAA's director of traffic safety advocacy and research. "Either I'm safe to drive or I'm not. Where I live shouldn't matter," he said.

Yet when Iowa drivers turn 70, they must renew their license every two years instead of every five. Neighboring Missouri lets the 70-year-olds renew every three years instead of every six.

Some states introduce age requirements after high-profile accidents. Massachusetts now requires drivers to start renewing licenses in person at age 75, with proof of an eye exam. The change came after an 88-year-old driver struck and killed a 4-year-old crossing a suburban Boston street in 2009.

This summer, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration proposed a national guideline for older driver safety that, if finalized, would push states to become more consistent. Among the recommendations: Every state needs a program to improve older driver safety; doctors should be protected from lawsuits if they report a possibly unsafe driver; and driver's licenses should be renewed in person after a certain age, tailored to each state's crash data.

Still, many states say their main focus should be on inexperienced teen drivers and problems such as texting behind the wheel.

"Teens are risk takers. Our older drivers are risk avoiders," said Alabama state Rep. Jim McClendon. Alabama drivers renew licenses every four years, with no older age requirements.

New Hampshire last year stopped requiring road tests when 75-year-olds renewed their licenses. The law was repealed after an 86-year-old legislator called it discriminatory.

It's not the only state worrying about age discrimination.

"You don't want to go around and say, `This person is 85. We've got to take them off the road.' That wouldn't be fair," said Assemblyman David Gantt of New York, where licenses last for eight years.

On the other side is the family of a Baltimore college student who died last year after being run over by an 83-year-old driver who turned into his bike lane. Maryland next month begins issuing licenses that last longer - eight years instead of five - despite an emotional appeal from the mother of Nathan Krasnopoler that that's too long for the oldest drivers.

"You should be looking at your drivers to be sure they're able to safely drive. There's plenty of research that as we age, things do change and we may not be aware of those changes," said Susan Cohen, who now is urging Maryland officials to study adding some form of competency screening, in addition to the required eye exams, to license renewals.

"Do we have to lose a 20-year-old with an incredible future ahead of him in order to determine that this particular driver shouldn't be driving?" she asked.

_____

Traffic challenges change for older drivers, who are less likely than younger ones to be in crashes involving alcohol or speeding. Instead, they have more trouble with intersections, making left turns, and changing lanes or merging, because of gradual declines in vision, reaction times and other abilities, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Scientists are hunting screening tests to check for such things as early warning signs of cognitive problems that might signal who's more at risk. But such screenings are a long way from the local license office. In a closely watched pilot project, California tried a three-step screening process to detect drivers who might need a road test before getting their licenses renewed - but it didn't reduce crashes, sending researchers back to the drawing board.

Today, AAA's Nelson said in-person renewals are "the single most effective thing states can do to improve safety."

That's because workers in the driver's license office can be trained to look for signs of confusion or trouble walking as people come in - two big clues that they may have trouble behind the wheel - and refer those drivers for a road test or a medical exam to see if there's really a problem.

Virginia, for example, lets even the oldest drivers hold a license for eight years, but starting at 80 they must renew in person and pass an eye test. California has five-year renewals, and starting at 70 they must be in-person with both a written test and eye check.

Those eye tests can make a difference. In senior-filled Florida, 80-year-olds renew their licenses every six years instead of every eight, with a vision check each time. A study found highway deaths among Florida's older drivers dropped 17 percent after the vision test was mandated in 2003.

How long between renewals is best? There's no scientific consensus, but Nelson recommends every four to six years.

Another big key: Programs that make it easy for doctors, police and family members to alert licensing officials to possibly unsafe drivers of any age, so the experts can investigate. But in states that don't allow confidential reporting, families in particular hesitate in fear of backlash if upset relatives learn who turned them in.

Utah adopted confidential reporting in 2008 "to encourage more people to report problematic drivers without the risk of retaliation or repercussion," said Chris Caras of Utah's Department of Public Safety.

Nor should the question be only whether someone should drive or not: Iowa is leading a growing number of states that customize license restrictions to allow people to stay on the road under certain conditions. People with early-stage Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease, for instance, may qualify for a one-year license; people with other health conditions may be allowed to drive only during the day or within a few miles of home.

In California, older drivers who fail a regular road test sometimes get a re-test on familiar neighborhood roads to qualify for a restricted license. State traffic researchers expect demand for that option to grow, and are preparing to study if that tailored testing really assures safety.

Meanwhile, how can people tell how they do on the road?

But ultimately, "the only way you can assess any driver at any age is to sit in the seat next to them and watch them drive," said Coughlin.

These marketing tools can be used to meet your local needs and objectives while, at the same time, partnering with other States, communities, and organizations in support of this Halloween impaired driving prevention initiative.   This campaign is based on two basic principles: