MEDIA CONTACTS:
California Highway Patrol: Doris Peniche, [email protected]
Alhambra Police Department: Sgt. Gary La Guard, [email protected]
VEHICLE CHECKPOINT FRIDAY NIGHT AT UNREVEALED SPOT
CSULA, CHP to check drivers for sobriety, license, safety near campus
Los Angeles, CA – To curb drunken driving and to promote driving safety, Cal State L.A.’s University Police Department will team with other law enforcement agencies to set up a roadside alcohol and safety checkpoint Friday night, Sept. 18, somewhere near the University’s campus in eastern Los Angeles, adjacent to Alhambra.
The checkpoint will operate from 6 p.m. to midnight at an undisclosed location. Officers of the California Highway Patrol and the Alhambra Police Department will join UPD personnel at the checkpoint. Traffic volume permitting, all vehicles will be checked for drivers who are under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs or driving unlicensed.
According to Cal State L.A. Police Chief Greg King, “We want to give a clear message to those who might consider driving under the influence or unlicensed: ‘Think twice. Don’t do it. If you do, you break the law; and you jeopardize the lives of others.’ Too often members of our community are seriously injured or killed on local roadways by intoxicated, unlicensed and dangerous drivers. It’s senseless.”
In 2005 California reported 20,581 alcohol-related vehicle crashes, of which 1,387 were listed as fatalities.
At Friday’s checkpoint, officers will also enforce all other traffic safety laws – including those involving speeding, passing, turning and seatbelts.
Funded largely by a State of California Office of Traffic Safety Grant to Cal State L.A., the operation involves 14 members of the UPD (including seven officers), and, combined, two sergeants and six officers from the CHP and Alhambra Police Department.
According to UPD Sgt. Christine Dosland, “One of the night’s key goals is to coordinate with neighboring agencies to offer safe driving education. We also will identify and arrest, as appropriate, drivers who are under the influence and pose a public safety risk in the University community. And, specifically, we are aiming to reduce driving after drinking by University students and other young adults.”
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Working for California since 1947: The 175-acre hilltop campus of California State University, Los Angeles is at the heart of a major metropolitan city, just five miles from Los Angeles’ civic and cultural center. More than 20,000 students and 210,000 alumni—with a wide variety of interests, ages and backgrounds—reflect the city’s dynamic mix of populations. Six Colleges offer nationally recognized science, arts, business, criminal justice, engineering, nursing, education and humanities programs, among others, led by an award-winning faculty. Cal State L.A. is home to the critically-acclaimed Luckman Jazz Orchestra and to a unique university center for gifted students as young as 12. Programs that provide exciting enrichment opportunities to students and community include an NEH- and Rockefeller-supported humanities center; a NASA-funded center for space research; and a growing forensic science program, housed in the Hertzberg-Davis Forensic Science Center. www.calstatela.edu