Drinking and driving is a hazardous combination. As a result, penalties for drinking and driving are strict. The bottom line is: No one should consume alcohol and drive, because everyone's safe driving ability deteriorates after drinking - even minimally. Teen drivers, especially, lose their driving skills more quickly.

Consider these facts as published in You and the Drinking Driving Laws by the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles:

• One third of the fatalities in New York State involve impaired or intoxicated drivers and pedestrians
• With increased Blood Alcohol Content (BAC), crash risk increases sharply. A driver with a BAC of 0.08 is four times as likely to cause a crash as a driver who has not been drinking, while a driver with a BAC of 0.16 is 25 times as likely to do so.
• Young drinking drivers are at the highest risk of all. Drivers 20 years old or younger are almost three times as likely to be involved in alcohol-related fatal crashes than other drivers.

Leandra's Law
New York is one of 36 states in the nation with special child endangerment laws that impose tougher sanctions on individuals who place a child passenger at risk while driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

The Child Passenger Protection Act, known as Leandra’s Law, is named in memory of 11-year-old Leandra Rosado, who was killed when an SUV she and seven other children were riding in crashed on the Henry Hudson Parkway in Manhattan in October 2009. Leandra was the only person to die in the crash. The driver of the SUV was driving while intoxicated.

Under the law, courts must order all drivers convicted of misdemeanor and felony drunk driving charges – even first-time offenders and regardless of whether a child under 16 was in the vehicle at the time – to install and maintain ignition interlock devices on any vehicles they own or operate for at least six months at their own expense, in addition to any other terms of sentence.

You can read more about the law on our Leandra's Law palm card. (En español)

The New York State Governors Traffic Safety Committee and the NYS STOP-DWI Foundation have released the "Have A Plan" mobile app.

This app provides you with a timely and convenient resource that enables you to locate and call a taxi service, program a designated-driver list, educate yourself on Blood Alcohol Content levels as well as information on DWI laws and penalties, or even report a suspected impaired driver.

Download the app for your Apple, Droid or Windows smartphone today. It could save a life.

STOP-DWI is part of the Westchester County Dept. of Public Safety

The STOP-DWI (Special Traffic Options Program for Driving While Intoxicated) program was enacted by the New York State Legislature in 1981 for the purpose of empowering county governments to coordinate local efforts to reduce alcohol and other drug-related traffic crashes. The comprehensive and financially self-sustaining alcohol and highway safety program is based on the philosophy that innovative local efforts are the key to solving drinking/drugging driving problems.

Westchester County’s STOP-DWI Program develops and coordinates a well-rounded DWI countermeasures program that prioritizes general deterrence and the prevention of drunk driving through the increased certainty of arrest and conviction. To that end, STOP-DWI funds extra police patrols that are dedicated to DWI enforcement. The program also provides specialized testing equipment and offers training for law enforcement and community agencies. The District Attorney's office receives funds to hire an additional prosecutor who specializes in DWI cases. STOP-DWI also supports the Westchester County Probation Department in dealing with recidivist DWI offenders.  In addition, STOP-DWI funds public awareness campaigns to heighten awareness and educate the public about the dangers of drunk driving and the consequences that come with it.

Key Initiatives 

We all know that drinking and driving is a hazardous combination. Penalties for drinking and driving are strict. Young drivers, especially, lose their driving skills more quickly. And each year at Prom time, the county gears up its multi-faceted effort to keep kids safe and sober. Now students can even learn the perils of driving while under the influence through the experience of using the county's new computer-based driving simulator.

The Victim Impact Panel is an awareness program for offenders convicted of a misdemeanor for driving under the influence of alcohol or other drugs. Every year in the fall, the monthly meetings are set for the next year's Victim Impact Panel program.

The Social Host Law, enacted by the county Board of Legislators, provides penalties (fines and even jail time) to adults who host drinking parties for their underage children. This law holds parents and other adults accountable for underage drinking that goes on in their homes.

Traffic safety programs
Parents and teachers, should check out the county driving simulators and county traffic safety programs, particularly the "Save Your Face, Click It or Ticket" program designed to educate teens to use seat belts. In fact, police are cracking down on texting while driving. Besides being a dangerous activity to perform while driving, it's against the law. New studies show that drivers overestimate their ability to multitask behind the wheel.

Try your hand at the "Gauging Your Distraction" game as featured in a series of articles, Driven to Distraction, in the Technology Section of the New York Times Web site. This game measures how your reaction time is affected by external distractions. Regardless of your results, the bottom line is that you should not text when driving.

Family Day
Family Day is celebrated on the fourth Monday of Sept. each year. This program encourages parents to take the time to eat dinner with their children. Parents need to understand that parental engagement fostered during frequent family dinners is an effective tool to help keep America’s kids substance-free.