San Diego’s Motorists Buckling Up

San Diego County is leading the state in compliance with the seat belt law, thanks in part to a North County education effort, traffic safety officials said Wednesday.

More than half the drivers and passengers in San Diego County were buckling up in November, 1986, compared with 42% of the drivers and passengers statewide. Moreover, compliance with the law in San Diego County has actually increased since last year, particularly in North County.

“San Diego has consistently gone up and we don’t know why. If we knew why, we would replicate it all over the state,” said Peter O’Rourke, director of the state Office of Traffic Safety.

O’Rourke and other traffic safety officials are touring the state to spread the gospel of seat belt use.

One factor that has contributed to San Diego’s high seat belt use is a health education program in North County that was launched last year.

Also a Health Issue

The program, funded by the Office of Traffic Safety, sends speakers to community groups and schools, helps employers develop mandatory seat belt policies to reduce health insurance costs, and cashes in on the fitness craze by presenting the safety benefits of seat belts in health terms--a semantic difference, but one that seems to reach people.

“A lot of people look at this as a safety issue, which it is. But it’s also a health issue,” said Lea Cassarino, who works for the county-run health center in Vista. By wearing a shoulder seat belt, the chance of being killed or seriously injured in a car accident is reduced by about a third.

Before the education program was launched, North County had the highest death rate in automobile accidents of any part of the county, partly because of the area’s vast number of two-lane highways, Cassarino said. Now, even though North County’s death rate is still high, more than 60% of the motorists there buckle up.

Since California’s seat belt law took effect Jan. 1, 1986, the percentage of motorists who wear seat belts has jumped from 28% to 42%, and the percentage has been increasing. O’Rourke attributed the sustained increase in part to a recent crackdown by the California Highway Patrol.

O’Rourke said California’s law still lacks teeth because it can be enforced only secondarily. That means that, unlike some other states--Texas, Connecticut, New York and Hawaii--California police officers cannot pull over a motorist simply for not wearing a seat belt. Only if the motorist is pulled over for another violation can the officer write a ticket for failure to wear a seat belt.

For the first three months after the law took effect, patrol officers rarely issued tickets for violations, said O’Rourke, a CHP captain on leave. “It was telling people, we’ve got a secondary law here, which means we may or may not be that serious about it, and (the CHP) just giving warnings doesn’t help,” he said.

The Riskiest Task

O’Rourke speaks almost religiously about traffic safety, pointing out that most people simply don’t take driving seriously. But “driving is the most difficult thing we do every day . . . you’re at greater risk in your automobile than you are at any time in your life,” he said.

Wearing seat belts is “not a panacea. People do die buckled up,” O’Rourke said. Still, shoulder seat belts, which will be installed in the back seats of all American cars next year, are the most widely available way to prevent injury or death in automobile accidents.

O’Rourke said he thinks people would comply with the seat belt law if only they understood the potential for disaster each time they get in a car.

“I don’t think there’s as much resistance to seat belts as we think. It’s just that people don’t understand that they need to buckle up every time they drive,” O’Rourke said. Studies have shown that as many as 70% of motorists in rush-hour traffic wear seat belts, apparently because they are more conscious then of danger.