Many Options for a Safe, Happy New Year’s Eve

Here’s some simple advice for Southern Californians planning New Year’s partying: Don’t drink and drive. If you do want to get into holiday spirits, get someone to drive for you.

From Ventura to Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego counties, police will be setting up sobriety checkpoints. The California Highway Patrol also will increase its freeway monitoring.

To imbibe safely, there are options. You can choose a designated driver in your group or hire a limousine. Or you can find out what groups will take you home--for free or for a nominal charge.

“There are CareCabs and Safe Rides that offer free rides if people have been drinking,” said Officer Jill Angel, a CHP spokeswoman. “We recommend those, but we’ve been highly promoting the designated driver program (in which) everybody partying has one person in their group who has committed to not drinking for the evening. Then the rest of the group doesn’t have to worry about drinking and driving.”

A designated driver program, promoted year-round by Mothers Against Drunk Driving chapters, enlists Southern California hotels and restaurants, asking them to offer free soft drinks, tea or coffee to the selected driver in partying parties.

Local MADD chapters can provide lists of restaurants participating in their designated driver program. (MADD chapters: Los Angeles, (818) 986-6233; Orange County, (714) 532-6233; San Diego, (619) 239-9466; Ventura, (805) 642-0885.)

Large restaurant chains volunteering for the MADD program include Tony Roma’s, Baxter’s and Cocos, El Torito and the Red Onion.

CareCabs, part of the nationwide CareCab program founded nine years ago to get drunk drivers off the road between Christmas and New Year’s, will give the tipsy a free taxi ride home from 7 p.m. to 3 a.m. daily until the morning of Jan. 2.

“We contract with various cab companies, and there is no obligation to pay unless the ride is more than 20 miles,” CareCab spokesman Lynne Marian said. “Then the rider is asked to pay the difference, if his home is farther than that.”

Since 1980, CareCabs have provided free rides home for about 70,000 people nationwide. “We’ve gotten a lot of drunks off the road and a lot of innocent lives have been saved,” Marian said.

Locally, the CareCab program is sponsored by CareUnits at hospitals throughout Los Angeles and Orange counties in conjunction with the Orange County chapter of MADD, and by CareUnits in San Diego and Ventura counties.

For a Free Ride

To get a CareCab ride, callers must be at a public place, such as a bar or restaurant, said Marian, who coordinates the yearly program as part of her job as public relations coordinator for CareUnit Inc. in Irvine.

“We don’t go to private residences because we think people having the party should be responsible for their guests,” Marian said. “And we take the person home, not to another bar or party. You would be surprised how many people call and ask that.”

Another free program is Safe Rides, aimed at keeping high-schoolers from getting behind the wheel after drinking. The program, only for those 18 and under, runs year-round on weekends in Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties. Most of the programs are based at high schools or hospitals and depend on volunteers to man phones on weekends from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. (some units run until 3 a.m.) They will pick up students at private residences and public places.

The Connecticut Boy Scouts of America founded the program in 1981. There are more than 700 Safe Ride units nationwide.

“We put the Safe Rides together as part of our Exploring program,” said Barbara Lowrey, coordinator of Safe Rides for the Orange County Boy Scouts. “We have co-ed driving teams, and then a person at the station to man the phones. We use seniors and juniors as drivers. The Council of Boy Scouts administers the training program and provides the primary liability insurance.”

“Safe Rides is a realistic approach,” said lawyer Vaughan de Kirby, a spokesman for the San Diego program, started four years ago. “We say, ‘We’re here to help you, and we are not going to ask you any questions or be judgmental.’ That’s better than having them drinking and driving. Last year on New Year’s Eve, we had 200 phone calls in the city and county of San Diego. So we’ll be busy this weekend.

“They call us and tell us they’re at X address and we’ll give them a safe ride to another location,” De Kirby added. “It’s a very unconditional program. We send a female and male together to pick up the person, so there won’t be any kind of problems. Our big problem with the program is volunteers. We just get a good set and then they graduate.”

A New Program

For Orange County residents, Gulla’s Towing Service in Westminster has instituted a new holiday program this year. Gulla’s will tow your car to your home for $10 any time Friday, Saturday or Sunday until Jan. 2 if you are within a five-mile radius.

“We started it because one of our drivers lost his wife and son to a drunk driver,” Gulla’s office manager Jennifer Bauer explained. “We wanted to do something as an incentive to keep drunk drivers off the road. We take teen-agers and adults, and we take them home only. We’re anticipating New Year’s Eve to be our busiest yet.”

If you want free coffee on the way home New Year’s Eve, 7-Eleven convenience stores will provide a cup. The chain also has been handing out red ribbons for drivers to tie on their antenna or door handle as part of MADD’s Tie One On for Safety, a promotion of sober driving during the holidays.

And in case you’re partying at home, CHP’s Angel has some tips for the hosts and hostesses of New Year’s Eve events.

“We tell them not to serve alcohol late in the evening, to stop an hour before the end of the party,” she said. “And to be sure to feed people substantial food that absorbs alcohol--more than chips and dips. Serve hors d’oeuvres with substance and finger sandwiches. . . . Cut down on the salty things that make people drink more. Have drivers to take people home.”

If I’m drunk don’t let me drive. CALL ONE OF THESE NUMBERS

Los Angeles County CareCab (800) 422-4143 Safe Rides (213) 451-9111 (213) 272-5483 (818) 244-RIDE (818) 701-RIDE Orange County CareCab (800) 422-4143 Safe Rides (714) 774-2020 (714) 532-8020 (714) 730-7508 San Diego County CareCab (619) 697-4040 Safe Rides (619) 486-3000 Ventura County CareCab (805) 487-5358