Traffic Crashes Down

Posted by Steve Roos in on 2:18 PM



[The Guys Who Keep You Safe] 
If you get stopped for texting or speeding in Idaho Falls, there’s a good chance it will be from one of these guys.  Thanks to their excellent work, traffic crashes are down 20% from last year and traffic injuries are down 23%.

Any police officer can write a ticket.  But we have six officers in our Traffic Unit that specialize in traffic related matters such as crash investigation and traffic enforcement.  Did you know that there is more death, injury, and property loss from crashes than from all other crimes combined?  If you saw what they saw, you might have a little more understanding when they don’t “give you a break”.

So what’s their quota?  There isn’t one.  In fact, I’ve been asked about ticket revenue by the finance people (and a city council member once) and I have one answer that I give everyone.  The reason we write tickets is safety and I could care less about revenues.  In my view, if the city really needs more money, they should ask the citizens directly. 
We didn’t accomplish the traffic crash reduction alone.  We work with the City Electric Division and the Public Works Division for safer design and signage.  I’ve blogged about the results on Hitt Road and next week, I’ll have the preliminary numbers on Holmes.  Also, Idaho Falls Community Pathways caught my attention on bike and pedestrians which led to my interest in crosswalk safety and enforcement.
The bottom line is that I’m much more interested in traffic crashes than I am ticket counts.  That’s why I couldn’t be more pleased with the results we’re getting.
FYI - last year, IFPD’s 91 officers wrote 10,171 tickets.  Of those, 5,717 were written by the Traffic Unit.  There were 772 crashes with 361 injuries.