‘Click It or Ticket’ Memorial Weekend National Seat Belt Campaign May-22-June 4

As summer kicks off and families hit the road for vacations, the Texarkana Arkansas Police Department is reminding motorists to 'Click It or Ticket' in a recent press release. Aimed at enforcing seat belt use to help keep you and your family safe, the national seat belt campaign will take place May 22 through June 4, concurrent with one of the busiest travel and holiday weekends of the year.

“Our law enforcement personnel see firsthand the loss of life when people refuse to buckle up,” said Texarkana Arkansas Police Sergeant Les Hunter. “It’s such a simple thing, and it should be an automatic next step after sitting down in a vehicle.” As the Memorial Day weekend approaches and the summer vacation season ramps up, “We want to keep our community members safe, and make sure people are doing the one thing that can save them in a crash: buckling up. If the enforcement crackdown wakes people up to the dangers of unrestrained driving and gets them to buckle up, we’ll consider it a success.”

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, nearly half of the 22,441 passenger vehicle occupants killed in crashes in 2015 were unrestrained. At night from 6PM to 5:59AM, that number soared to 57 percent of those killed. That’s why one focus of the Click It or Ticket campaign is nighttime enforcement. Also, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, almost twice as many males were killed in crashes as compared to females, with lower belt use rates, too. Of the males killed in crashes in 2015, more than half (52%) were unrestrained. For females killed in crashes, 42 percent were not buckled up.

Sergeant Les Hunter asked you to help spread this life-saving message before one more friend or family member is killed as a result of this senseless inaction. Seat belts save lives and everyone – front seat and back, child and adult – needs to remember to buckle up, every trip, every time.

Officers with the Texarkana Arkansas Police Department will be out patrol the area for violators not wearing their seat belts during this time and will stop those who are not following the Arkansas State law.

You can visit the Texarkana Arkansas Police Department online at their website.