Arkansas City police will use a federal grant to crackdown on drivers not wearing their seat belts during the first week of July, chief Sean Wallace said.
The enforcement blitz will run July 1 through July 7 and is designed to promote a higher level of seat belt usage in rural areas of the state like Ark City. State numbers show that seat belt usage in the southeastern portion of the state is lower than the state average, Wallace said.
Counties included in the campaign are Allen, Bourbon, Cherokee, Cowley, Crawford, Labette, Montgomery, Neosho, Wilson, and Woodson.
"Rural driver’s believe they have a much lower risk of being in a crash, because traffic volumes are much lower. But traffic volume is only one contributing factor to crash statistics," Wallace said.
The rural seat belt enforcement campaign is funded by a grant from the National Highway Safety Administration and is being coordinated by KDOT’s Traffic Safety Office, in cooperation with state and local law enforcement and other groups.
It is part of the Federal and State Click It Or Ticket seat belt enforcement and advocacy campaign designed to save lives.
Kansas has a secondary seat belt law which means drivers can only be ticketed if they are in an accident or pulled over for speeding or another infraction. A primary seat belt law made it through the state Senate this Legislative session but the measure failed in the House.
