CLEARFIELD – Grant money is helping local law enforcement keep drivers safe.
At Thursday’s work session, Officer Nathan Curry told the Clearfield Borough Council about recent traffic details made possible through grants the department had recently received.
The first was the Teen Seatbelt grant. Curry said this grant allowed officers to patrol for 11 days toward the end of October to target teens who were not wearing seatbelts. He said the officers worked for about 20 hours and only had one seatbelt violation.
“This was good,” Curry said. “Out of all the vehicles we made contact with, only one wasn’t wearing a seatbelt so it shows our young people are being safe.”
Curry said during the detail, 11 citations for other violations were issued and the officers also found several individuals who had outstanding arrest warrants.
“The officers involved did a great job to show the community that we are enforcing these laws,” he said.
In addition to the seatbelt checks, the officers set up an information site near the junior-senior high school during dismissal time to hand out pamphlets containing safe driving information.
Curry said the officers handed the information out to about 100 cars with multiple students in each car. Curry thanked the school and the Lawrence Township police for allowing the officers to pass out the pamphlets.
The second was a Roving DUI grant that allowed the officers to team up with DuBois City police and Lawrence Township police to conduct DUI patrols over Halloween weekend.
Curry said the patrols were targeting impaired drivers. He said the officers made three DUI arrests and issued several other citations during the patrols.
Curry said the grants provided 100 percent reimbursement to the department for the officers’ wages while the patrols were being conducted and he thanked the officers who participated.