RADD Youth Coalition and HBO Awarded A Governors Highway Safety Association Peter K. O'Rourke Special Achievement Award
Unique Coalition of media, cause marketing, public and private partners recognized for their outstanding efforts in underage drinking and alcohol related driving prevention through the free educational distribution of the HBO Family documentary SMASHED: Toxic Tales of Teens and Alcohol
OKLAHOMA CITY, Sept. 19 -- What do you get when a major entertainment brand, a leader in highway safety marketing, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and numerous organizations and businesses pool their resources? A 2006 Governors Highway Safety Association's (GHSA) Peter K. O'Rourke award!
On Tuesday, September 19th, Erin Meluso, President of RADD; the Entertainment Industry's Voice for Road Safety and Dolores Morris, Vice President of HBO FAMILY Programming, Production and Acquisition, were honored at the annual GHSA Conference in Oklahoma City. GHSA presented them with a Peter K. O'Rourke Special Achievement Award on behalf of the RADD Youth Coalition and its youth outreach program, featuring the award-winning HBO Family documentary 'SMASHED: Toxic Tales of Teens and Alcohol'.
SMASHED, produced for HBO Family by the husband and wife team of Kirk Simon and Karen Goodman, is a hard-hitting documentary that pulls no punches. Filmed at University of Maryland Medical Center's Shock Trauma Unit, it follows the fate of 6 young people suffering serious head injuries as a result of alcohol related injuries. Told through the voices of the medical personnel, the patients' families and the survivors themselves -- all trying to live with the aftermath of similar injuries -- this film focuses on consequences by depicting the permanently changed lives and on-going struggles of those who do not die.
"We knew we had a product on our hands that could help educate and save lives," says Dolores Morris, VP of HBO Family Programming, Production and Acquisition, "the question was how to take it from the screen to the classroom and the community to have maximum impact. We are very proud of our partnership with RADD and its network and honored to be recognized with a Peter K. O'Rourke Award."
Since the formation of the RADD Youth Coalition in 2004, founding members RADD, HBO and NHTSA along with other members of the RADD Youth Coalition have distributed over 25,000 copies of SMASHED to schools, community groups, youth courts and military bases at no cost to recipients. The RADD-HBO SMASHED Community Kit also contains a complete set of educational materials; a discussion guide, classroom curriculum and other supplemental materials. The Kit was designed to spark important discussions on prevention and finding local solutions to curb underage drinking and alcohol related driving. SMASHED has been successfully utilized as a tool in classrooms, school assemblies, community forums, town hall meetings and pre-deployment military programming.
"RADD formed the RADD Youth Coalition in response to our nation's urgent, on-going need to stem underage drinking. Our guide was the report, Reducing Underage Drinking: A Collective Responsibility, issued by the Institute of Medicine of The National Academies, recommending that media, entertainment, parents and peers be brought together to develop solutions and SMASHED gave us the tool. RADD is grateful to HBO Family for producing the hard-hitting SMASHED documentary and generously granting royalty-free educational rights to RADD," says Erin Meluso, RADD President. "Thanks to the generosity of HBO, NHTSA and RADD's Directors, SMASHED is empowering communities to address local solutions to prevent underage drinking and improve teen driving behavior year-round, not just during prom and graduation season."
The 2006 Peter K. O'Rourke Special Achievement Awards are given to organizations, agencies or individuals with significant accomplishments in the field of highway safety during the 2005 calendar year. The RADD Youth Coalition was chosen by GHSA from a diverse field of applicants for its unique partnership and wide reaching program. The Coalition continues to fulfill its mission in 2006/2007, conducting further research on the efficacy of SMASHED screenings in sparking community change and working with select states to develop on-going opportunities to talk to young people, their parents and their communities about the dangers of underage drinking and alcohol related driving.
* RADD (Recording Artists, Actors and Athletes Against Drunk Driving),
'The Entertainment Industry's Voice for Road Safety', is an
internationally recognized non-profit organization that empowers
celebrities and media partners to create positive attitudes about road
safety. Founded in 1986, RADD advocates the use of designated drivers
for adults, seatbelts and safe driving through control behind the wheel
for all, making responsible behavior the norm. RADD's messages are
non-judgmental, hip and positive. Other RADD celebrity messengers
include Aerosmith, Sir Paul McCartney, Shaquille O'Neil, Marc Anthony,
Faith Hill, Beyonce Knowles, Justin Timberlake and more than 500
others, all of whom have lent their image, voice and/or support to RADD
over the years to deliver RADD's life saving message. RADD's goal is
to reduce fatalities and injuries across all age groups by promoting
safe, sober driving and awareness of road safety.
* The RADD Youth Coalition partners include; founding chair RADD, the
Entertainment Industry's Voice for Road Safety, www.radd.org; with HBO
Family, www.hbo.com; National Organizations For Youth Safety (NOYS),
www.noys.org; Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD),
www.sadd.org; Family Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA),
www.fcclainc.org; The Bacchus Network, www.bacchusgamma.org; The WB's
'Everwood'; www.thewb.com; and Federal RADD Coalition partners: US
Department of Transportation (lead), www.nhtsa.dot.gov, SAMHSA, an
agency of the US Department of Health and Human Services; US Department
of Education Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools; and US Department of
Justice Office of Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention(OJJDP).
Underwriting for the initial coalition project has been generously
provided by HBO Family, www.hbo.com; Inspired Corporation,
www.inspiredcorp.com; Sonopress, www.sonopress.com; National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), www.nhtsa.dot.gov; and
Davis-Glick, www.davisglick.com AGI Polymatrix, www.meadwestvaco.com,
and Disc Graphics, with additional sponsor support generously provided
by Liberty Mutual Insurance, www.libertymutual.com and National
Organizations For Youth Safety (NOYS); www.noys.org.
* HBO Family is the home of commercial free, non R or TVMA-rated
programming selected to satisfy the needs of different age
groups. From 6 AM until 9 AM, HBO Family offers educational and
entertaining original series for pre-schoolers. Starting at 9 AM,
there are predominantly G and PG-rated movies which are of interest to
young viewers as well as grown-ups. After 2 PM, hit PG-13 movies are
added to the mix, chosen for after-school viewing by older children.
The nightly movie at 7 PM is a destination for the Family audience to
find the channel's most popular titles. From 8:30 PM until 6 AM --
when young children are asleep -- HBO Family features movies and
specials with a more mature feel, targeted toward adults who prefer
programming without objectionable content.
* NHTSA (The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration), under the
U.S. Department of Transportation, was established by the Highway
Safety Act of 1970, as the successor to the National Highway Safety
Bureau, to carry out safety programs under the National Traffic and
Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966 and the Highway Safety Act of 1966
* GHSA (Governors Highway Safety Association) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit
association that represents the highway safety programs of states and
territories on the "human behavioral aspects" of highway safety. Areas
of focus include: occupant protection, impaired driving and speed
enforcement, as well as motorcycle, school bus, pedestrian and bicycle
safety, and traffic records. GHSA's mission is to provide leadership
in the development of national policy to ensure effective highway
safety programs. The Association provides a collective voice for the
states in working with Congress and the federal agencies to address
their safety challenges.
* The Peter K. O'Rourke Award is named for Peter K. O'Rourke (1943-1996),
past GHSA chair and highway safety leader. He began his career as a
California Highway Patrolman, where he witnessed the devastating
consequences of vehicle crashes first hand. He served to make highways
safer through many roles. He was director of the California Office of
Traffic Safety under two governors and was instrumental in the passage
of several important pieces of safety legislation. The national
respect gained from his commitment to highway safety lead O'Rourke to
be elected chair of GHSA by his peers. After leaving state government,
he served as vice president of The Century Council, where he worked on
prevention of underage drinking and drunk driving.