The Lake County Sheriff’s Office earned first-place in the 2015 Illinois Traffic Safety Challenge for sheriff departments with 101-250 sworn officers. The annual Illinois Traffic Safety Challenge is coordinated by the Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police (ILACP) Traffic Committee and supported by a NHTSA grant, administered through IDOT’s Division of Transportation Safety as well as private funding.

The challenge targets three major traffic safety priorities: occupant protection, speeding and impaired driving. In 2015, the Lake County Sheriff’s Office conducted a series of DUI enforcement details, including each collaborative initiative with NHTSA and IDOT including “Click It or Ticket” and “Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over” campaigns.

Sheriff Mark Curran stated, “We take traffic safety seriously. I’ve said it many times, each year we see far too many lives lost to reckless actions on the roadways. We are working hard to reduce the number of injuries and lives lost due to careless driving and bad choices.”

Undersheriff Ray Rose added, “Receiving this award is a great honor, and it demonstrates how diligently the Sheriff’s Office Highway Patrol Division works at keeping our roadways safe. The Lake County Sheriff’s Office participates in numerous traffic safety campaigns throughout the year, in an effort to keep our motoring public safe.”

Monthly traffic safety campaigns in 2015 included Roadside Safety Checks, DUI Patrols, Seat Belt Safety, Distracted Driving or Construction Zone Patrols. Below are statistics for 2015:

Lake County’s safety belt use rate in the beginning of 2015 was 96%, increasing slightly to 96.1% at the end of the year, and nearly 1% higher than the state’s 2015 average use rate of 95.2%.