After the Bakersfield Police Department, California City Police Department and Kern County District Attorney's Office were awarded grants last week, Porterville police are the most recent to be awarded a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS).
The Porterville Police Department was awarded $69,860 for a year-long program of special enforcement and public awareness efforts to prevent traffic-related deaths and injuries.
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The number of people killed in traffic-related incidents across the state has risen to nearly 17 percent with 3,176 killed in 2015, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
"This grant brings both tactics together with the Office of Traffic Safety and the Porterville Police Department working in concert to help keep the streets and highways safe across Porterville and the state," OTS Director Rhonda Craft said.
Activities that the grant will fund include:
- Educational presentations
- DUI checkpoints
- DUI saturation patrols
- Bicycle and pedestrian safety enforcement
- Motorcycle safety enforcement
- Distracted driving enforcement
- Speed, red light, and stop sign enforcement
- Compilation of DUI “Hot Sheets,” identifying worst-of-the-worst DUI offenders
- Specialized DUI and drugged driving training such as Standardized Field Sobriety Testing (SFST), Advanced Roadside Impaired Driving Enforcement (ARIDE), and Drug Recognition Evaluator (DRE)
Funding for this program is from the California Office of Traffic Safety through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
