$425k grant funds DUI operations for Glendale police through 2019
Residents may want to reconsider getting behind the wheel after a night out drinking cocktails at a bar because the Glendale Police Department has received a $425,000 grant to fund traffic-enforcement operations through 2019.
The grant comes from the California Office of Traffic Safety and will go toward several education and enforcement activities conducted by the department including DUI checkpoints, saturation patrols and the identification of repeat DUI offenders.
The grant will be effective until Sept. 30, 2019.
Glendale Police Chief Carl Povilaitis said in a statement the funding will help the department continue its efforts to reduce traffic fatalities and improve road safety as well as raise awareness that “collisions can often be preventable.”
In addition to DUI enforcement, the grant will also help fund other safety operations including patrols at city cross streets with a high rate of pedestrian- and bike-related collisions.
According to collision statistics from the California Office of Traffic Safety, 697 people were arrested for DUI in Glendale in 2015.
The agency’s numbers are several years behind the current date because the data relies on information provided by several other government agencies including the state Department of Justice, California Highway Patrol and the state’s Department of Transportation.
For more current numbers, the Glendale Police Department reports that 374 people were arrested for drunk driving in 2017, a drop from the 435 who were arrested in 2016.
Since the beginning of this year and up until August, the department reports that 223 people have been arrested for drunk driving in Glendale.
The Office of Traffic Safety also reports that Glendale saw 56 drunk driving-related collisions that resulted in injury or death in 2015.
Five collisions involved those under the age of 21, while 21 incidents involved those between the ages of 21 and 34.
Twitter: @Andy_Truc
