Pa. police put holiday travelers on notice
PennDOT and State Police are stepping up enforcement efforts on Pennsylvania’s roadways this weekend.
As the last holiday of the summer, statistics show there tends to be an uptick in motor vehicle accidents over Labor Day.
This year, law enforcement is focusing especially on impaired driving due to drugs, not just alcohol.
PennDOT spokeswoman Erin Waters says since 2005, the number of annual alcohol-related accidents has decreased, but drug-related crashes are trending upward.
“Enforcement will vary by region but we will have hundreds of municipal police departments and also all of our DUI task forces statewide participating,” she said. “They’ll be stepping up checkpoints and roving patrols as a part of this effort.”
Waters says the agency is paying for the roughly four-day crackdown with federal funds.
PennDOT gets just more than $4 million to spend on such enforcement efforts throughout the year.
During last year’s Labor Day weekend, there were 111 alcohol-related crashes and three fatalities, as well as 22 drug-related crashes.
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