Impaired drunken driving occurs citywide
Gilroy – Making merry around the holidays often means picking snifters of eggnog, cider or wine, but it shouldn’t mean grabbing the car keys, too.
As the holidays near, many cities and counties kick off their annual “Avoid” campaigns, step up traffic stops where police pass out educational literature – and pull a few soused drivers off the streets while they’re at it. In April, Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith recommended that Santa Clara County continue the program, funded by a three-year $322,880 grant.
But in Gilroy, driving drunk doesn’t begin with the onset of twinkling lights and Christmas carols.
“For us, DUIs are not seasonal,” Sgt. Kurt Svardal said. “They’re constant.”
Not only are they constant – they’re everywhere. In the past year, DUIs have been spotted at big intersections and tiny side streets, at 9am and in the wee hours. Where people are driving, it seems, they’re drinking and driving.
But Gilroy’s highest-DUI corridors don’t align with traffic counts. Though Leavesley Road has more than triple Monterey Street’s traffic, according to city data, it has roughly the same number of DUI arrests as the downtown core. Tenth Street, with almost double downtown’s traffic, has had fewer DUIs. Svardal said that’s because both 10th and Leavesley are commuter arteries, which hit their peak at rush hours, not late at night when drivers are most often found driving drunk. Comparing all-day traffic counts to nightly DUIs is “comparing apples to oranges'” he said: Afternoon commuters aren’t likely to be hitting the sauce.
Fewer DUI arrests were made in the largely residential western sections of Gilroy. Daily traffic on Santa Teresa Boulevard rivals that of downtown Monterey, but its DUI count is far lower.
Bar locations were not a factor in DUI counts, Svardal said. Liquor licenses are sprinkled across Gilroy, according to data supplied by the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC). While the perception may be that downtown is where the bars are, you can lift your spirits just as easily at Applebee’s in the Gilroy Premium Outlets as you can at Chips N’Salsa downtown.
Statewide, about half of impaired drivers were drinking in bars, clubs or restaurants before being stopped, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA.)
However, bars may contribute obliquely to the DUI count. Since bars and restaurants generate more calls to police, such as noise complaints, more officers are in those areas to observe suspected DUI drivers.
“We have a lot more patrolling activity in the downtown area because people tend to congregate more, and they have more calls for service in that area,” said City Councilman Craig Gartman. “Maybe that’s why we see DUIs where we do.”
Gilroy’s bars undergo an annual re-permitting process, coordinated by Sgt. Dan Castaneda. Last week, Castaneda kicked off the process, reviewing the number of calls from different Gilroy bars, and reminding bar owners of their legal responsibilities – not serving obviously intoxicated patrons and ensuring all are of legal age to drink. Bars can also face penalties from ABC, said spokesman John Carr. DUI education is a component of the agency’s education for licensees, which discusses designated drivers and taxi cab lists.
“If someone served an obviously intoxicated patron, or if they served a minor who got a DUI, there could be liability'” Carr said. “If there is a minor involved, we’ll open an investigation to hunt for the source of the alcohol.”
If bars stopped serving intoxicated patrons, the NHTSA estimates, alcohol-related crash fatalities would drop 11 percent. Overall, alcohol-related crashes cost California taxpayers $12 billion in 1999, and accounted for 20 percent of statewide auto insurance payments.
It’s a problem, said Mayor Al Pinheiro – but government can only go so far.
“People have to be responsible for their acts'” he said. “If we have a speed limit, why do people speed?”
