Sobriety Stops: Safety vs. Rights

Laguna Beach last week debated the merits and inconveniences of its periodic sobriety checkpoints, and decided to continue them. As it sorts issues of congestion and respecting rights, motorists who pass that way can reflect on the best, most practical and efficient solution. They should know the law and their limits, and make prudent judgments about driving through an area where they, and people like them, tend to let their hair down.

Laguna’s attraction is that it isn’t like other places. Its difference is in part because it is reachable only through a beautiful but hazardous canyon road or over a heavily traveled coastal highway. Each presents unique vistas and challenging driving conditions. The beauty and the road risks are part of the same package. Include in the mix the festive and party-like atmosphere that attracts visitors.

Laguna is also a place where families live, and safety always is foremost in the minds of residents in resort communities where visitors tend to behave in ways that they might not behave at home. Councilman Paul Freeman recently sought to end the checkpoints as an infringement on civil liberties, an impediment to the flow of traffic and a waste of money. When he did, his proposal was met with stiff opposition from PTA parents, who want their city to remain tough on drunk driving.

Checkpoints are an inconvenience, and while driving is a privilege, they may open the door to the abuse of citizens’ rights. At the same time they can be a way to educate the public about drinking and driving, and potentially, a weir to capture drunks. Laguna ranks 15th out of more than 400 cities statewide in the number of alcohol-related driving accidents per capita, according to Police Chief Jim Spreine. Its checkpoint is run each month, usually on a weekend at night either on Laguna Canyon Road or Pacific Coast Highway. But checkpoints must safeguard liberty and keep traffic moving. The public education component also can be achieved in other venues; for example, motorists assigned to traffic school make captive audiences for instructors who cover a range of safe-driving topics.

Revelers who head to places like Laguna to leave another world behind should consider what they might be returning to if apprehended, an altered lifestyle that makes a day at traffic school seem mild. It can mean thousands in court costs, loss or restricted use of a vehicle, lost pay and humiliation. All of this even without getting anybody injured or killed, the biggest consequences of them all.