Click It or Ticket

On Sunday police agencies across Oregon started a two-week campaign to ensure kids riding in cars are properly buckled in.

The Oregon Department of Transportation will use federal dollars to pay for police overtime during the “Click It or Ticket” effort.

This is money well spent. According to ODOT, about one-third of kids younger than 8 who were killed or hurt in a car crash last year were either unrestrained, or were not sitting on a booster seat.

During these campaigns police should focus on children rather than adults. An ODOT study estimates that 96 percent of drivers and front-seat passengers use their seat belts, so there’s little room for improvement there.

Although seatbelt use crackdowns are valuable, we encourage police to consider devoting more money to extra patrols aimed at stopping intoxicated drivers. OSP arrested 208 drivers for DUII between Aug. 15-Sept. 1, for instance.

If you don’t latch your belt you endanger only yourself. Drive drunk and you threaten every person in every vehicle you get close to.