Stay up to date with Responsibility.org

Lifesavers Conference kicks off Alcohol Responsibility Month with Traffic Safety leaders

Earlier this week, members of our traffic safety department attended the Lifesavers National Conference on Highway Safety Priorities in Long Beach, California, with hundreds of law enforcement officers, educators, and safety advocates. The Lifesavers Conference offers a unique opportunity for traffic safety professionals to share valuable information about what they do and learn from each other about the successes and challenges they have experienced working to keep everyone safe on America’s roadways.

Lifesavers 2016 logo, courtesy of Lifesavers National Conference on Highway Safety Priorities.
Lifesavers 2016 logo, courtesy of Lifesavers National Conference on Highway Safety Priorities.

 

This year’s conference was the perfect way to kick-off the month of April, which is Alcohol Responsibility Month. We talked to attendees about our new campaign, Responsibility Starts with Me, and asked them what “responsibility” means to them when it comes to consuming alcohol. We attended thought-provoking sessions and heard from leaders in the safety community, including National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Administrator Mark Rosekind; Joseph A. Farrow, Commissioner of the California Highway Patrol; Adrian Lund, President of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety; and Colleen Sheehey-Church, President, Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

 

During the conference, we worked with the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) and Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD) to highlight some of their legislative efforts this year. SADD and FCCLA are working in Colorado, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Florida and Maryland to advance legislation to reduce alcohol and drug-impaired driving, especially among people under the age of 21.

Dr Jim Hedlund
Dr. Jim Hedlund discussing our joint report with the Governor’s Highway Safety Administration on drug-impaired driving.

 

We were also pleased to host safety advocate and author Tim Hollister in our booth during the conference. Tim signed copies of his new book, His Father Still: A Parenting Memoir, for attendees, and discussed the results of a new national report on ways to improve safe driving contracts between parents and teens. Tim’s 17-year-old son Reid died in a single-car crash in 2006; since then, Tim has become a nationally-recognized advocate for safer teen driving, first through his national blog for parents, “From Reid’s Dad,” and his book NOT SO FAST: Parenting your Teen through the Dangers of Driving, which is available both in English and in Spanish.

We enjoyed meeting many new passionate voices in the safety community during our time at Lifesavers and encourage them to keep making strides toward a safer future on our nation’s roads.

Devin Burke, Manager, Government Relations and Traffic Safety, joined Responsibility.org in 2011 and immediately became interested in the organization’s many programs and issue areas, especially those related to judicial education.

Receive the Latest News and Research

Welcome to Responsibility.org! We’d love to have you as part of our community. We send updates on how you can help end drunk driving, prevent underage drinking, and make responsible choices about alcohol. Get our news straight to your inbox.

No Thanks