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Jan Withers: Thank you, Secretary Porcari.
Drunk driving is still our nation's most commonly committed
violent crime.
In 2010 alone, 10,228 people were killed, and another 345,000
people were injured by drunk driving.
This is a very personal issue for me.
On April 16th in 1992, my 15-year-old daughter, Alisa,
was spending the night at her best friend's house.
It was spring break and the girls decided to hang out with
two senior boys, one who my daughter's friend had
a crush on.
It seemed harmless enough.
However, what the girls didn't know is that the boys had picked
up a couple of cases of beer earlier in the evening.
The boys drove them out to a local pond where only the boys
proceeded to drink.
When it came time to drive the girls home, the driver, now
intoxicated, decided to try to scare the girls by driving over
100 miles an hour.
He lost control of the car and hit a guardrail, tearing off the
right side of the car and throwing Alisa out of that side
into the woods.
She died of her injuries the next morning.
Alisa's story really touches on every aspect of the traffic
safety issues we are trying to tackle at MADD.
And how we do it is very important.
MADD pursues solutions that science has proven to work.
In 2006, we launched the first comprehensive campaign solution
to this issue.
We call it our campaign to eliminate drunk driving in the
hopes that we would be standing here today with the promise of
elimination within reach.
The campaign outlines three steps to make drunk driving a
thing of the past.
First, support the heros who keep our roads safe.
Our law enforcement personnel work long hours and often put
their own lives at risk to keep us safe.
High visibility law enforcement, which includes sobriety
checkpoints, remains one of the most important tools that we
have in our arsenal.
Study after study shows that when done correctly, sobriety
checkpoints not only catch drunk drivers, but also discourage
others from driving drunk.
Second, require all convicted drunk drivers to drive sober
before they start their car by installing ignition interlocks
in their vehicles.
This includes first-time offenders.
Because conservative estimates show DUI offenders have driven
drunk at least 80 times before they are arrested.
And we know that these devices are extraordinarily effective.
For example, all offender interlocks laws in Oregon and
Arizona have contributed to a decrease in drunk driving deaths
by 52 and 51%.
Compare that to the traditional license suspension where 50 to
75% of convicted drunk drivers continue to drive
without their license.
So you see, data gives us important information to apply
to our solutions.
The eventual solution and what will ultimately eliminate drunk
driving is advanced technology.
Tomorrow's cars will automatically and unobtrusively
determine whether or not the driver is at or above the
illegal limit of a .08
BAC, and fail to operate if the driver is impaired.
The technology is called DADSS, it's called Driver Alcohol
Detection System for Safety.
And its research is a result of a cooperative agreement with the
auto industry and the federal government.
The progress on DADSS is absolutely remarkable.
And the life-saving progress, more than 8,000 lives a year,
according to one estimate, could one day prove significant in our
effort to eliminate drunk driving.
Data informs all that we do.
Good data helps inform how law enforcement spends their
resources and where checkpoints are set up.
Good data helps inform our policies at MADD.
Not a day goes by that we don't use the Center for Disease
Control interlock studies or National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration's data, or state-by-state breakdowns
of the problem.
And getting people to understand the problem
is key to what we do.
With the DADSS program, we're going to have a car that will
secure the future and prevent drunk driving.
But we won't get it out there if people don't understand the
program and appreciate what the technology can do for them.
So that's why we're issuing this challenge.
We know that making data available helps people
understand the problem.
You can help by translating that data to everyday Americans.
So the challenge is create the best infographic to the drunk
driving data at safety.data.gov and other government sites.
You can find links to some of these sites that we use every
day in MADD at MADD.org\datachallenge.
And second, submit your infographic online by
October 15th.
We'll select the best one or two or three from around the country
and use them to publicize the issue in our November media
release for our Tie One On For Safety campaign.
Leading into the holidays each year, we launch our Tie One On
For Safety campaign in early November.
It is MADD's long-running awareness campaign to educate
and remind people about the impacts of drunk driving.
Your infographic could be seen by tens of millions of people
and save hundreds of lives when people see it and choose to
drive sober this holiday season.
Thank you.
(applause)