State of Alabama Fiscal Year 2012 Annual Report Robert Bentley, Governor Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs Law Enforcement and Traffic Safety Division Jim Byard, Jr., Director William M. Babington, Governor’s Highway Safety Representative December 20, 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS Overall Program Goal / Accomplishments………………………………………………………..4 Police Traffic Services Programs…………………………...……………..…………….…….….5 Community Traffic Safety Programs…………………….………..…...…………..…………...…5 Center for Advanced Public Safety (CAPS) ……………………………….………………….….6 Observational Survey of Occupant Protection and Child Restraint Use……………………….…9 Child Passenger Safety (CPS) Program…….…..…………………………….……………...…..10 Occupant Protection and Child Restraint Use Special Enforcement Program………….....….....13 Impaired Driving Special Enforcement Program.……………………….……………........…....14 Impaired Driving Paid Media Campaign………………….…………………………….……….16 Impaired Driving Paid Media Evaluation………..............................................................………18 Impaired Driving High Visibility Enforcement……………………………….....….………..….21 High Fatality Alcohol STEP Enforcement Program Grant………………….…………………...21 Occupant Protection Paid Media Campaign……………..…….……………….....……………..21 Occupant Protection Paid Media Evaluation…....……….……..……………..….….…………..23 Occupant Protection High Visibility Enforcement…….……………………….…..……………25 Traffic Safety Resource Prosecutor Program…………………………………...….……….…...25 Driver’s License Suspension Appeals Program….……………………………...….….………...27 Alabama Yellow Dot Program………………………...……………………..……………..……29 Alabama Driver Attitude Report 2012……………………………………...……………………30 Traffic Safety Information Systems…………………….…….……….…………………………32 Electronic Patient Care Reporting (e-PCR) Assistance Program ………...………….…….……37 Alabama Traffic Records Coordinating Committee (TRCC)...….………………………..……..37 Legislative Summary………………………………………………….…….…………………...38 Statewide Statistics………………………………...………………..…….…………….…….…39 2 Alabama FY12 Traffic Safety Performance Measures……………………..…………………....40 Alabama Traffic Safety Activity Measures……………….……………………………………..43 Overall Program Goal ……………………………..……………………………...…….……….45 3 Overall Program Goal/ Accomplishments The Alabama Highway Safety Plan (HSP) is produced each year to provide the specification for the allocation of funds within the purview of the Federal Section 402 Program, which is administered by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). This plan reflects the efforts that have been made to assure that these funds are allocated optimally in order to bring about the maximum reduction of crash-caused fatalities and severe injuries on Alabama roadways. By federal law, these highway safety funds must be used to support State and community programs to reduce deaths and injuries on the highways. Section 402 sets forth the minimum requirements with which each State's highway safety program must comply, and Alabama has met these requirements since the onset of the program in the late 1960s. The Governor of Alabama administers this program through the Alabama Office of Highway Safety (AOHS), which is located within the Law Enforcement and Traffic Safety Division of the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs (ADECA). Alabama’s overall vision in developing the Highway Safety Plan was “To create the safest surface transportation system in the Southeast by means of a cooperative effort that involves all organizations and individuals within the state who have traffic safety interests.” This included the ideals of saving lives, reduction in suffering, focus on speed and alcohol related hotspots, teamwork and diversity. The mission to be accomplished by implementing this plan is to “reduce fatalities by focusing on the problem locations identified for speed and alcohol related hotspots.” Goals were set for each of the individual related crash (injury and severity) cause types as will be discussed later in this report. The traffic safety community within Alabama recognizes that even if these goals are met there will still be an intolerably high death and injury toll. An overall program goal was set “To reduce the fatal mileage rate in Alabama by 25% from 2.0 in 2006 to 1.5 per 100 million vehicle miles traveled by calendar year 2013.” The fatal mileage rate went from 2.0 in 2006 to 1.81 in 2007 which is a drop of 9.5%. This well exceeds the reduction expected for one year and will help in reaching the goal set. For the second year (CY 2008) the state had a goal of an additional 8% reduction. The fatal mileage rate decreased from 1.81 in 2007 to 1.63 in 2008, a 9.4% reduction. In CY 2009 the goal set called for an additional 5% reduction. The reduction from 1.63 to 1.51 (adjusted rate for the FY2012 HSP) was a drop of approximately 7.4%, which is above the goal set for a single year. The rate once again dropped in 2010 from 1.51 to 1.34. Therefore Alabama met the overall program goal that was set. This was a rewarding accomplishment; however traffic safety professionals and all concerned will continue to work to reduce this rate even further each year. 4 Police Traffic Services Programs Total FY 2012 Expended Funds - $1,523,216.54 - Funding Source - Section 402 Our general implementation strategy has been to require the Community Traffic Safety Program/Law Enforcement Liaisons (CTSP/LEL) project directors to focus their plans solely on speed and alcohol hotspot crashes and the problem locations identified for their respective regions. By doing this, we have been able to focus on the biggest problem areas for traffic safety. In the nine regions, participating law enforcement agencies (which includes municipal, county and state agencies) conducted sustained enforcement of statutes at a minimum of one activity per month to address impaired driving, occupant protection, and driving in excess of posted speed limits. In addition, the participating agencies conducted Driving Under the Influence (DUI) checkpoints and saturation/directed patrols during at least one weekend per month. Crash Summary In Alabama in 2011, 894 people were killed on the highways, up from the 2010 total of 862 fatalities. The Number of Fatalities Involving Driver or Motorcycle Rider with .08+ BAC increased from 267 in 2009 to 264 in 2010. Number of Speeding-Related Fatalities decreased from 327 in 2009 to 316 in 2010. In 2011, the Number of Serious Injuries in Traffic Crashes was down to 9,904 compared to 10,522 in 2010. Community Traffic Safety Programs Total FY 2012 Expended Funds - $1,844,005.14 - Funding Source - Section 402 There are nine Community Traffic Safety Program (CTSP) regions in Alabama. These nine regional offices serve as the main coordination center for traffic safety programs in the State. These offices coordinate traffic safety enforcement, educational and training programs for local communities. Most of the funding received by the State Office of Highway Safety (OHS) is subgranted to these regions for disbursement through subgrants to municipal, county and state law enforcement agencies. The nine CTSP regions participated in two statewide enforcement campaigns in 2012. These campaigns took place during the Memorial Day and Labor Day holiday periods. There were no specific statewide enforcement campaigns for the Thanksgiving or Christmas/New Year’s holiday periods. The CTSP project directors conducted regular meetings with law enforcement committees in their respective regions. These committees serve a number of vital functions that include, but are not limited to: reporting enforcement data, enlisting non- participating agencies to join the committees, and determining allocation of subgrant funds per crash data obtained from the Center for Advanced Public Safety (CAPS). The Northeast Alabama Highway Safety Office continued their involvement in implementing the “Yellow Dot” program to seniors and other interested motorists. This program began 5 with regional interest but has slowly been made available throughout the State of Alabama. The Alabama Office of Highway Safety (AOHS) continues to hold quarterly meetings with the CTSP project directors. These meetings began in 2003 and serve a useful function as a coordination and information exchange forum. Center for Advanced Public Safety (CAPS) Data and Information Technology Support Total FY 2012 Expended Funds - $545,584.34 - Funding Source - State Traffic Safety Trust Fund The University of Alabama Center for Advanced Public Safety (CAPS) and ADECA have had a long standing relationship in working together to help improve traffic safety. CAPS provides ADECA with valuable statistics, data and analysis tools relating to traffic safety. The use of this data is particularly important as emphasis is placed on strategic planning for highway safety and as ADECA works to base subgrant funding awards on crash data. The development and deployment of the eCite project is a key area where CAPS and ADECA have worked together in an effort to improve the quality of data being gathered and the safety of the state’s law enforcement officers. The funding that CAPS receives from ADECA is crucial in conducting projects to improve law enforcement and traffic safety. In FY 2012, CAPS supported the Alabama Office of Highway Safety in many ways including fulfilling information requests that are made of the CAPS staff, preparing reports and statistical information for grant applications when requested, assisting with the development of the State's Highway Safety Plan and continuing to spread eCite to law enforcement agencies throughout the state. CAPS also coordinated the phone surveys concerning the "Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over" campaign project and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and Governors Highway Safety Administration (GHSA) survey on driver attitudes. Specific accomplishments in each area are listed below. CARE Software Program In the efforts to support the traffic safety community in the State of Alabama, CAPS staff members responded to over 165 requests for traffic crash data. These included requests from CTSPs regularly, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Coordinators, Department of Transportation, Department of Public Safety, state troopers, county and municipal agencies, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), Television reporters, NHTSA personnel, planning commissioners, the public, various media outlets from across the state, engineers, and others. These requests varied in complexity and the amount of time required fulfilling the request. Some requests required several follow-ups to complete. Each of these requests was responded to as quickly as possible in order to give the user the timeliest data. 6 Improvements to the Critical Analysis Reporting Environment (CARE) systems are ongoing, and updates to these systems are released approximately every two months. Data releases for the CARE program are made on a regular basis as data are made available to provide the users with the most up to date data possible for their analyses. Highway Safety Plan The Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 Highway Safety Plan was developed by CAPS personnel, ADECA staff and through the use of the CARE program. This report was submitted to NHTSA and approved. Regional data was also made available to each of the CTSP offices via electronic format. Electronic Citation Distribution and Expansion and Technical Support The distribution and expansion of eCite, our electronic citation software, is a big part of this project. At the direction of the AOHS, CAPS completed many eCite deployments to local agencies this year. Training sessions were held on most Thursdays. Software CDs are mailed out to agencies upon request. About 26 training sessions were conducted during FY12. Some of these were "Train the Trainer" sessions so these officers can go back and train others at their agency. Manuals are printed and distributed for each officer at each training session. Darrell Arnold is the eCite trainer. Mr. Arnold traveled to several of the Trooper Post meetings to talk about new changes and developments CAPS is working on and to get feedback from the troopers on software usage. Mr. Arnold would also conduct a brief demonstration of Alabama Dashboards for Visualization, Analysis and Coordinated Enforcement (ADVANCE) at these trooper meetings and also at all eCite training sessions so officers become aware of ADVANCE and it capabilities. In addition to training, Mr. Arnold has completed a tremendous amount of software testing of eCite, eCrash, the new eForms and other CAPS software products. Mr. Arnold is an effective liaison between the officers using the software and our CAPS developers because he communicates well with both groups. CAPS provides technical support to all users that call or email them with questions in a very timely manner. These calls cover a wide range of topics and questions. They work with both the law enforcement agencies and the municipal court personnel to make eCite more efficient for all concerned. CAPS also receives requests for assistance with eCite integration into the police or court records management systems (RMS). Rhonda Stricklin is the Point of Contact for these requests and coordinates between CAPS personnel and the vendors and keeps records of all agencies requesting integration and the specifics for that integration. CAPS has had many new municipal courts begin integrating with eCite this year so they are able to pull the data directly into their court RMS and without manually entering the data which saves a tremendous amount of time for the clerks. CAPS updated the web service so that Police Department RMS vendors can also pull the data into the police records 7 management system which is of great benefit to the police agencies. Police agencies have started requesting this vendor integration service as well. As a service to Law enforcement, CAPS offers eCite equipment packages for sale at cost. This involves putting all equipment items out for bid every 6 months, sending out quotes and then invoices, ordering equipment and then shipping it out to the agency when it is received by CAPS. Rhonda Stricklin manages this process and directs Connie Harris on the various tasks involved to help maintain this deployment. This year 43 equipment orders for various law enforcement agencies were filled. The total amount of all 43 orders was $71,950. CAPS also sent out 72 quotes for equipment that are in various stages of the ordering process. Survey Services and Administrative Support CAPS assisted in the "Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over" campaign. This campaign focused on the importance of not drinking and driving and involved a strong media and enforcement blitz focused on the Labor Day Holiday weekend. In order to measure the effectiveness of this campaign, The University of Alabama subcontracted with an agency known as Abt Schulman, Ronca and Bucuvalas, Inc. (Abt SRBI). AbtSRBI performed telephone surveys from a representative portion of the state in order to determine whether or not the campaign was a success. CAPS worked closely with AbtSRBI in order to refine the survey questions being asked as well as the counties that were included in this statewide survey. The results of the phone survey were compiled by AbtSRBI and provided to ADECA. CAPS assisted with another survey this year. The other survey was a driver attitude survey conducted at the request of GHSA and NHTSA. CAPS once again contracted with AbtSRBI to conduct the phone surveys. CAPS instructed AbtSRBI as to the questions and counties that were included in the survey of the state. The results of the phone survey were produced by AbtSRBI and forwarded on to ADECA. CAPS personnel also provided administrative support to the AOHS in facilitating the Traffic Records Coordinating Committee meeting by developing and giving presentations at the meeting, helping coordinate the meeting including the development of the agenda, sending invitations and taking the minutes of the meeting. CAPS personnel also provided report writing or grant writing support to the AOHS whenever called upon in a very timely manner. CTSP Web Portal A model CTSP web site needs to be developed and pilot tested by one of our CTSP Coordinators. While this web site will be immediately put into service for a pilot Region, it will be designed as a model to work for all the CTSPs. This will allow them to electronically report their special enforcement activities funded through the Alabama Office of Highway Safety (AOHS) by enabling the local agencies that are funded to do selective enforcement and other programs to report them to the CTSPs. The CTSP 8 Coordinators can then use it to report their collective activities to ADECA/LETS. This will save all of the CTSP Coordinators and the local reporting agencies a considerable amount of effort, which can then be re-applied to their traffic safety endeavors. This project was started late in the fiscal year but great progress has been made. CAPS provided a demonstration to Eddie Russell to get feedback. Mr. Russell showed a favorable response to the program. CAPS provided a demonstration to AOHS staff members in November. We think the site should be ready for release early next year. Observational Survey of Occupant Protection and Child Restraint Use Total FY 2012 Expended Funds - $148,266.90 - Funding Source - Section 405 The Injury Prevention Branch of the Bureau of Health Promotion and Chronic Disease, within the Alabama Department of Public Health, conducts an annual survey of vehicle seat belt usage and child restraint usage throughout Alabama. Year 2012 marked the twenty-third time that the required National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) guidelines were followed for the surveillance procedure. Survey Design The NHTSA sampling system incorporated a probability based multi-staged stratified sampling approach. This approach provided data for rural and urban highways. This sampling system did not, however, overlook the larger counties, as all four metropolitan areas (Jefferson, Madison, Mobile, and Montgomery) are included in the survey. A total of 15 counties actually composed the entire survey area. In addition to the four metropolitan areas, 11 counties were randomly selected from a pool of the 37 largest counties in Alabama. A majority of Alabama residents are in the sample pool, since 85% of the state’s population lies within these 37 counties. The counties are Blount, Colbert, Escambia, Etowah, Houston, Jefferson, Lawrence, Lee, Madison, Marshall, Mobile, Montgomery, Shelby, Tuscaloosa, and Walker. Occupant Restraint Observational Survey For the seat belt usage survey, 23 sites in each of the 15 counties were randomly selected based on the Average Daily Traffic (ADT) totals supplied by the Alabama Department of Transportation. In the survey, ADT’s are broken down into three categories: low (0- 4,999), medium (5000-10,499), and high (10,500-75,000). At least one site from each category is surveyed in each county chosen. A total of 345 sites were selected and observed for one hour, using the curbside lane as the reference position. At each site, surveillance was done to determine the number of people in the front outboard seats of the cars and the number of these occupants wearing seat belts. This year, Survey 1 was conducted during a two-week period during April 2012 and Survey 2 took place during a two-week period in July 2012. 9 Child Restraint Observational Survey The child restraint survey took place at 10 randomly selected sites in each of the 15 counties. The counties and sites are the same as those in the Click It or Ticket (CIOT) campaign. At least one site from each ADT category was surveyed in each county chosen. Each site required one hour of direct observation. The survey required a total of 150 hours of direct observation. All children who appeared to be age five and under were observed, in any position in the car. The survey sites selected proportionally reflect road travel in urban and rural areas and account for road volume. The survey results measured a proportional distribution which resembles the statewide population. The survey was conducted during August 2012. Occupant Restraint Survey Results The survey team observed a total of 70,288 front seat occupants in 53,538 vehicles throughout the 15 selected counties. It is of note that both Survey 1 and Survey 2 contained almost 10,000 more observations than any in recent years. Survey 2 results show that Alabama is estimated to have a weighted safety belt usage rate of 89.46%. Variance (V) was calculated to be 0.2694Pec and Standard Error (SE) was calculated at 5.19, both well under acceptable levels. Montgomery County had the highest usage rate of 94.309%. Escambia County’s restraint rate was 84.337%, the lowest rate of the surveyed counties. There were 35,292 females and 34,996 males observed in Survey 2. Attempts that showed gender but were unable to determine restraint use included an additional 5 attempts, all passengers. The effect of the intervention was calculated to be 1.767%. Child Restraint Survey Results The survey team observed a total of 3,997 children, approximately aged five and under, in any position in the vehicle, of those 3,705 were restrained. Alabama was estimated to have a child restraint usage rate of 93.045%. Madison County had the highest rate of 98.507%. Colbert County had the lowest rate of 88.562%, followed closely by Walker County with 88.957%. Observations of unrestrained children accounted for 6.955% of all observations. Child Passenger Safety (CPS) Program Total FY 2012 Expended Funds - $114,765.42 - Funding Source – Section 405 Alabama continued with the Child Passenger Safety (CPS) program that began in FY 2006. In that year, we established a single CPS coordinator augmented with three instructors from the CTSP offices and tasked them with addressing CPS from a regional perspective. The CPS program was continued through FY 2012. The overall goal of the CPS program remains to have more child restraint technicians available so that it will lead to an increase in the child restraint usage within the State of Alabama, resulting in a reduction of fatalities. 10