Toccoa Police urges motorist to use caution and drive sober during New Year’s travel period

As the New Year’s holiday is rapidly approaching, state troopers across Georgia are preparing for holiday weekend patrols.

State troopers will be conducting high visibility patrols on the heaviest travel days of the holiday period to remind drivers to drive safely.

The 78-hour New Year’s holiday travel period gets underway at 6 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 29, and ends at 11:59 p.m. on New Year’s Day.

The Toccoa Police Department’s Police Chief Tim Jarrell told WNEG News about how his team of officers are gearing up for the holiday travel period.

“We will be out in force, we will be aggressively pursuing impaired drivers,” Jarrell said. “We are hoping everyone will abide by the law and rules of the road.”

During the New Year’s travel period, last year, eight people were killed, along with 595 crashes and 289 injuries reported.

In addition to the traffic crash investigations last year, state troopers issued 6,400 citations and 10,905 warnings during the New Year’s holiday.

Most fatal crashes during a holiday period in Georgia involve an impaired driver, speed, or the person killed not utilizing a seat belt.

In some crashes a combination of the contributing factors is found.

Toccoa’s Interim Police Chief Jimmy Mize told WNEG News that there would be increased patrol of Big A Road.

“We will have several road checks set up, in conjunction with other agencies in our area,” Mize said. “We will also be traveling Big A Road in hopes of reducing accidents and incidents there.”

During last year’s New Year’s holiday period, 289 arrests were made for driving under the influence.

During this travel periods, the Georgia State Patrol will again be teaming up with other law enforcement officials for the Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over and Operation C.A.R.E. enforcement campaigns.

Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over is a high visibility enforcement campaign that targets impaired drivers, and Operation C.A.R.E. or Combined Accident Reduction Effort’s, goal is to reduce the number of crashes, injuries and fatalities on the nation’s roads by balancing high visibility enforcement with educational outreach.

Mize added that he hopes everyone has a safe and happy New Year.