
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, February 23, 1995                   TAG: 9502230090
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

FEWER AUTO DEATHS TIED TO ALCOHOL

Alcohol-related traffic deaths fell to their lowest level in a dozen years last year, and Transportation Secretary Federico Pena says it's his goal to save an additional 6,000 lives annually by 2005.

At the conclusion of a forum on drunken driving Wednesday, Pena said preliminary figures indicate that 42 percent - or 16,884 - of the 40,200 traffic deaths recorded in 1994 were influenced by alcohol.

In 1993, Pena set a goal of reducing the proportion of alcohol-related deaths from 46 percent to 43 percent of all highway fatalities by the end of 1996.

Because of the unexpected headway, he announced a new goal - reducing drunken-driving deaths to 11,000 annually by 2005 - saying ``our progress so far tells us that we can achieve this goal.''

``This is an extraordinary national tragedy that many have come to accept as unalterable,'' Pena said at a news conference.

The number of people killed in alcohol-related crashes has been declining since 1987. Alcohol was a factor in 57 percent of all highway deaths in 1982, when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began keeping data.

Representatives of some of the 100 community and safety organizations, automobile and insurance companies attending the two-day forum drafted proposals on how to get the ``don't drink and drive'' message to those who need it most - alcoholics and repeat offenders, adults aged 21-34 and people under 21.

Their recommendations included checking repeat drunken-driving offenders for blood alcohol content that's below the legal limit of 0.10 percent in most states, reducing the legal blood alcohol level nationwide, restricting driving privileges for individuals caught driving drunk and beefing up existing laws.

``Most of our recommendations are not complicated,'' said Barry Sweedler, representing the National Transportation Safety Board. ``It just takes political will, commitment and hard work.''

Pena and Ricardo Martinez, administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, said they would review all of the proposals to determine which ones can be implemented.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., said federal highway safety laws are among the government's most effective initiatives and promised to fight congressional efforts to repeal some of them.

``The American people don't want to sacrifice their children or their loved ones to America's highways,'' said Lautenberg, the sponsor of legislation in 1984 that encouraged states to raise the legal drinking age to 21.

Keywords:
FATALITY

by CNB