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Monday, May 22, 2023

Click It or Ticket 2023

No matter what type of vehicle you drive, one of the safest choices you can make -- whether you're a drive or a passenger -- is to simply buckle up.

It may be an easy thing to forget when you get behind the wheel but law enforcement will be out in force and more active on the roads leading up to the Memorial Day holiday this week as part of Click it or Ticket. The campaign kicked off today and will run through June 4. It aims to remind drivers and their passengers about the importance of seat belt use. The legal consequences and fines for not wearing seat belts might be a pain in the wallet -- a maximum penalty of $46 in New Jersey -- but the potential life-and-death consequences can be much more severe.

In 2020, almost 11,000 unbuckled passenger vehicle occupants were killed in crashes in the United States, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Young adults (18 to 34 years old) killed had the highest percentages for all age groups that were completely unrestrained – 60%. According to the most recent data from the state Division of Highway Traffic Safety (DHTS), there were 160 unbelted fatalities in 2021, and 47 percent of all motor vehicle occupant fatalities were unrestrained. Almost a quarter of all unrestrained occupants killed in motor vehicle crashes over the past five years were between the ages of 25 and 34.

This year, 134 New Jersey law enforcement agencies have received almost $800,000 from the DHTS to help pay for increased patrols, seat belt checkpoints, and other initiatives during “Click It or Ticket.” Last year, police from 145 departments issued 8,373 seatbelt citations, wrote 3,315 speeding summonses, and made 278 impaired driving arrests.

Here is a list of the 2023 grantees in New Jersey.