Hardcore Drunk Driving Judicial Education Project
Alcohol Awareness Month, all year long
April 1st is a very important day to us here at The Century Council. While other organizations joke on April Fool’s Day, we face a serious reality: Underage drinking and drunk driving remain serious problems, despite the progress made against them. We want to let you know what we’re doing to make a fight these problems.
Coming off our visit to the 2010 Winter Games, We just recently wrapped up an electrifying post-Winter Games Ask, Listen, Learn tour with Apolo Anton Ohno, the most decorated U.S. Winter Olympian in history and star of the 2010 Olympic Games. We were thrilled to be able to bring him to see kids all over the country and tell them to say ‘YES’ to a healthy lifestyle and ‘NO’ to underage drinking.
We also recently filmed a series of PSAs for State Attorneys General with Dara Torres, five-time Olympian swimmer and winner of 12 Olympic medals. These PSAs will be airing in states all over the country in honor of Alcohol Awareness Month. Check out pictures from the event here!
Both of these stellar athletes are coming with us to Capitol Hill this month! On April 22nd, The Century Council is hosting an educational event on Capitol Hill that will teach parents and kids the importance of saying "YES" to a healthy lifestyle and "NO" to underage drinking. We’re doing this with our partners, the Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Foundation, the Artists and Athletes Alliance, and PE4Life.
We’re also starting to distribute our Ask, Listen, Learn interactive activities all over the country! We’ll be bringing it to roughly 250 schools and community groups around the country. We’ll also be posting online mini-games to Ask, Listen, Learn soon!
Lastly, Our Hardcore Drunk Driving Commuity Corrections Guide is coming out soon! This guide is designed to help probation and parole officers in monitoring hardcore drunk drivers under the care. We’ll be presenting it next week at this year’s Lifesavers Conference in Philadelphia, and posting it to our website shortly thereafter. Stay tuned!
In the News
Everyone should take a minute to listen to what Clarence Gage of Wisconsin has to say in this video clip. He's been caught drunk driving 18 times. As the article notes, he has been driving drunk for more than 45 years – since 1962. He can’t even remember how many times he’s been caught. Clearly, he doesn’t seem to care that he is arrested for driving drunk, and he does not fully understand the consequences that can occur when someone operates a vehicle while they are intoxicated.
The Century Council, the National Judicial College, the National Association of Prosecutor Coordinators, the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, the National District Attorneys Association, the American Probation and Parole Association, and the National Partnership on Alcohol Misuse and Crime, have come together to fight for additional resources to expand the use of specialized DWI courts and to provide comprehensive and continual training to judges, prosecutors, law enforcement officers and probation/parole/corrections/treatment officials. These DWI courts and trainings will help coordinate the prosecution, adjudication, supervision and treatment of all DWI offenders.
We must take decisive action to get these offenders off our roads.
In communities where these specialized courts and training programs have been implemented, the cycle is being broken by reducing recidivism among hardcore drunk drivers, who are responsible for 67 percent of all alcohol-impaired traffic fatalities. Drivers such as Clarence Gage
That's why we have come together to support recommendations for the Federal highway bill, SAFETEA-LU, that governs all the federal surface transportation spending in the United States – recommendations which will keep our communities safe and reduce the number of hardcore drunk drivers on our roads.
Learn more at www.centurycouncil.org/hardcoredrunkdriver.
The Century Council Presents Panel on Judicial Education at Lifesavers
The Century Council will be participating in the 2009 Lifesavers Conference from March 29th through April 1st, at the Gaylord Opryland Convention Center in Nashville, TN. As part of the conference's Criminal Justice series of workshops, The Century Council will be presenting the panel "Lessons Learned from Judicial Education on Hardcore Drunk Drivers".
This one hour session will consist of: an overview of the award winning Hardcore Drunk Driving Judicial Education Program, which includes the Hardcore Drunk Driving Judicial Guide: A Resource Outlining Judicial Challenges, Effective Strategies and Model Programs (PDF) and a series of judicial education workshops; a presentation on the findings of the project's Judicial Education Workshop's Evaluation (PDF); and the release of the new Hardcore Drunk Driving Prosecutorial Guide (PDF) developed in collaboration with the National District Attorneys Association.
In addition, information on The Century Council and its outreach materials designed to assist communities in their fight against drunk driving and underage drinking, will be available at the organization's booth in the conference's exhibit area.
Tribute to Kevin Quinlan
Kevin Quinlan was a founding and key member of the Coalition to Fight Hardcore Drunk Driving which is a collaborative effort to create synergy between various organizations' with similar goals and initiatives. The Coalition, formed in 2000, includes the Automobile Association of America (AAA), the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), and The Century Council.
The Coalition performs a valuable service to States and communities, and their respective legislators by assisting in the passage of these key legislative items. This assistance can take several forms: providing testimony in support of key legislation, testimony in opposition to legislation, meeting with key legislators to enlist their support of key legislation.
Kevin's knowledge and presence in the legislative community were significant factors for The Coalition has being highly acclaimed for its collaboration in legislative efforts in the following areas: Administrative License Revocation (ALR), zero tolerance laws, BAC test refusal and ignition interlock, in many states across the country.
Please read the Congressional Record Statement honoring Kevin Quinlan, below:
January 15, 2009 - Extension of Remarks - Rep. Shelley Berkley
Tribute to Kevin E. Quinlan
Madame Speaker, as co-chair of the Congressional Stop DUI Caucus, I rise today in tribute to one of the nation’s top traffic safety officials, who passed away suddenly.
Kevin E. Quinlan was the Chief of the Safety Advocacy Division of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Mr. Quinlan was with the Safety Board for nearly 20 years, serving as the Alcohol and Drug Program Coordinator and Chief of the Safety Recommendations Division. He was instrumental in promoting State action on Safety Board recommendations to reduce fatalities, injuries, and crashes in all modes of transportation. Mr. Quinlan authored five major studies for the Board. Prior to his work with the NTSB, Mr. Quinlan served in the U.S. Army for 29 years, receiving the Legion of Merit and Meritorious Service Medal. He has an undergraduate degree from Boston University and graduate degrees from William and Mary, the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, and the U.S. Air Force Air War College.
Mr. Quinlan loved to travel and was skiing in Vermont when he suffered a fatal heart attack. He was well-respected and admired by everyone in the traffic safety community. He was a mentor to countless traffic safety advocates and an inspiration to the thousands of people who lost loved ones to the preventable crime of drunk driving. One of his greatest passions was the fight to stop drunk driving. His expert testimony led to the passage of many effective countermeasures across this nation. His work has saved countless lives and I ask that my colleagues join me in honoring him today.
DWI Deaths: Is it Murder?
Last night Bob Simon of CBS's 60 Minutes ran a story called "DWI Deaths: Is it Murder?".
Martin Heidgen, a drunk driver who ran into a limo carrying the Flynn family in July 2005, had a blood alcohol level three times the legal limit. Seven-year-old Katie Flynn was brutally killed in the crash. Her grandfather, Chris Tangney, was injured so badly that he was given last rights by Monsignor William Costello. Ironically, six months later, that same priest was hit by a drunk driver named Karen Fisher, a repeat offender.
The Century Council has a name for drunk drivers such as Mr. Heidgen and Ms. Fisher: hardcore drunk drivers. We applaud Nassau County (NY) District Attorney Kathleen Rice’s efforts to prosecute drunk drivers to the fullest extent of the law in her continued efforts to stop drunk driving. The public, law enforcement, the judiciary, and legislators all have a role to play in the effort to keep our roads safe.
We invite you to learn more about hardcore drunk drivers, our work with prosecutors and judges across the country, and our efforts to fight drunk driving by visiting our website - www.centurycouncil.org.