Santa Barbara - July 31st, 2008

FIESTA CELEBRATION DUI ENFORCEMENT

AVOID THE 12 SETS SOBRIETY CHECKPOINT FOR FRIDAY NIGHT DURING FIESTA CELEBRATION Supplementing the heavy police presence at Santa Barbara’s Fiesta, Avoid the 12 will sponsor a Friday night sobriety checkpoint near downtown, according to County Sheriff’s Deputy Win Smith. Avoid the 12 is the combined effort of all dozen law enforcement agencies in the county and is aimed at ridding the roads of impaired drivers. Officers from the Sheriff’s Dept., Lompoc, Guadalupe and UCSB police along with California State Parks and Allen Hancock College District officers will staff the checkpoint. More than a hundred deputies will be assigned to the historical and children’s parade and to day and night foot patrol. The California Highway Patrol’s Santa Barbara Area Command will staff another checkpoint on Saturday night. “Last year, there were so many law-enforcement officers and taxicabs at Fiesta that most people who had been drinking didn’t even think about getting behind the wheel,” Smith remarked. The California Office of Traffic Safety funds Avoid the 12 and 40 similar countywide campaigns throughout the state.