highway safety proposal
From The St. Louis Business Journal:
And speed kills. If Blagojevich wanted to reduce highway fatalities he could push to reduce speed limits.
But it seems possible that this program is designed to appeal to police and firefighter unions and provide political cover for new road construction/maintenance money while he's cutting the state's education contribution. But maybe I'm just being cynical.
IDOT to develop statewide highway safety planThe biggest cause of highway deaths is drinking and driving, right? Is there something the state can do to reduce drinking and driving it's not already doing?
The Illinois Department of Transportation will develop the state's first statewide safety initiative with a goal to reduce highway deaths, said Gov. Rod Blagojevich Thursday.
IDOT's Division of Traffic Safety and Bureau of Safety Engineering will develop and implement the comprehensive plan, along with public and private transportation professionals, state and local law enforcement officials and others. They plan two meetings this month, with approval of the plan expected for later this year.
The safety effort is expected to focus on engineering, enforcement, education and emergency services.
And speed kills. If Blagojevich wanted to reduce highway fatalities he could push to reduce speed limits.
But it seems possible that this program is designed to appeal to police and firefighter unions and provide political cover for new road construction/maintenance money while he's cutting the state's education contribution. But maybe I'm just being cynical.
posted by Carl Nyberg at 9:13 AM
2 Comments:
Carl,
IDOT has developed and implemented a highway safety plan (hsp) for 20-plus years. This plan must be written in order to receive federal highway safety funding. Last July they laid-off and abolished the entire traffic safety/safety projects section who were responsible for writing the hsp (guess what? we were all republicans!!) and most of us were replaced by Blagojevich campaign workers and others with absolutely no traffic safety experience. They claimed we were a duplication of services and we were part of a "re-organization" in which it took months after the lay-off to produce the so called re-org plan. I know I sound bitter but we were a very dedicated bunch and many of our programs took years and years to establish...in the past few years after we finally received approval to market our programs in the media (Click it or Ticket, Drive Hammered Get Nailed)as well as the passage of the primary seatbelt law (which the guv did not really support until it came with a bonus of receiving more highway safety funds (probably for him to divert!!))we were able to move our numbers and save many more lives. This is just a PR stunt for this administration and they are taking credit for initiatives that have taken years and years to put into place. If Blagojevich was so concerned with traffic safety then why did he take Illinois State Troopers off our highways to accompany him to California this past summer to stop traffic so he could speed on thru to get to his destination quicker. Blago- a traffic safety advocate...no...I don't think so!! P. S. I love your BLOG...Kepp up the good work!!
Amen, amen, amen, amen!
So many people who are commenting on the situation at Traffic Safety do NOT have the slightest idea of what went on there. The dedicated staff (mainly the project managers and their immediate supervisors -long term employees) worked hard to write, process and manage the hundreds of Traffic Safety Grants that were annually given to local law enforcement agencies, hospitals and universities. This FACT seems to have gotten lost in the flurry of accusations and concerns over who got what.
For the democrats to try to take credit for anything having to do with increased Safety on our highways is so laughable it borders on being insane.
Pluzzzzzzzzzzeezzzzzzze - They went in and TOTALLY abolished the section that was dedicated to Traffic Safety. They have parsed out the various duties (as they see it) associated with the Federal Traffic Safety Program to a variety of people with no central location for any one project. The way these grants are being "managed" doesn't have the slightest comparison to the way they were before.
They don't give a damn for the "program" if they had they would not have "abolished" all the workers with years of "expertise."
I can't wait until the Feds do an audit on these grants and the way the money is being spent. I fail to see how the appropriate checks and balances can be in the "project files" with the present way of running things.
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