TxDOT Kicks Off Annual Click It or Ticket Campaign

SAN ANTONIO--Texas is mounting its most ambitious campaign ever to remind drivers and passengers to buckle up or pay the consequences. Over the past week and a half, larger-than-life Click It or Ticket messages have popped up on landmarks from one end of Texas to the other, including Amarillo’s Cadillac Ranch, the San Jacinto Monument near Houston, the Fort Worth Stockyards and the Rose Garden in Tyler.

These unconventional reminders are all part of TxDOT’s Click It or Ticket campaign to boost safety belt use in Texas and save lives. Today, state officials launched the annual effort by buckling up a giant safety belt at what is perhaps the state’s most revered icon — the Alamo.

“Thanks to Click It or Ticket, 90 percent of drivers in Texas now use their safety belts,” said Carlos Lopez, TxDOT’s traffic operations director. “For those folks who aren’t in the habit of always buckling up, we know that it often takes the threat of an expensive ticket to get them to do the right thing.”

From May 21 to June 3, state troopers, police officers and sheriff’s deputies statewide will be stepping up enforcement of the state’s safety belt laws. Drivers, front seat passengers and children under 17, whether riding in the front or back seat, must be buckled up. Also, children under five years old and less than 36 inches tall must ride in child safety seats. Adults who don’t use safety belts or fail to secure their children face fines up to $200, plus court costs.

The number of Texans complying with state safety belt laws has steadily climbed from 76 percent to slightly more than 90 percent since the Click It or Ticket effort began five years ago. Researchers say pickup drivers and passengers and teens continue to be the least likely to buckle up. In 2005, more than half of those killed in rollover crashes in Texas were not wearing safety belts.

Safety advocates report that drivers and passengers who buckle up have a 50 percent better chance of surviving serious traffic collisions and avoiding serious injuries. Since the Click It or Ticket campaign was first launched in Texas in 2002, there have been 1,200 fewer traffic fatalities in Texas and 28,000 fewer injuries as a result of increased safety belt use.

Some of the partners joining TxDOT in the campaign are the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Texas Department of Public Safety, local law enforcement agencies across the state, the Texas Department of State Health Services, the Texas Cooperative Extension, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, the Texas Municipal Police Association, AAA Texas and NASCAR.

For more information contact Mark Cross in TxDOT’s Public Information Office, 512-463-8588.

TxDOT’s five goals: reduce congestion, enhance safety, expand economic opportunity, improve air quality, increase the value of transportation assets.