The Executive Office of Public Safety and Security’s Office of Grants and Research (OGR) awarded the Springfield Police Department a grant to increase patrols and remind drivers and passengers about the life-saving benefits of wearing a seat belt. Massachusetts law requires every person in a passenger motor vehicle to wear a safety belt or be properly restrained if it is a child. Any driver who is stopped by a law enforcement officer for a primary traffic violation and is not wearing a safety belt can be fined $25. Although a secondary offense for adults, not wearing a seat belt is a primary offense for children under 13-years-old. If a child is not wearing a seat belt the driver can receive a citation.
“The goal of this campaign is to enforce the law, but also educate our drivers about the importance of wearing a seat belt and having a child in a car seat,” said Springfield Police Superintendent Cheryl Clapprood. She adds, “Seat belts are proven to save lives. Unfortunately the lack of seat belt usage is seen far too often when investigating serious or fatal crashes.”
In 2021, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 11,813 passenger vehicle occupants killed in crashes were not wearing seat belts. Among young adults (18-34) killed, 59% were unbuckled, one of the highest percentages for all age groups.
In 2017, seat belts saved an estimated 61 lives in Massachusetts and an additional 45 deaths could have been prevented if those individuals had been wearing a safety belt, according to the Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety.
The grant is funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration through the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security’s Office of Grants and Research (OGR).
Data Provided by the Executive Office of Public Safety:
Massachusetts' seat belt use rate is consistently lower than the national average, ranking 45th in the 2019 seat belt observational study.
At 81.6% use, over 1.2 million Bay Staters still are not regularly buckling up. The national seat belt use rate is 90.7% (2019)
In Massachusetts, a larger percentage of pickup trucks (71%) and SUVs (65%) fatalities are unrestrained compared to passenger cars (60%).
According to NHTSA, seat belts saved an estimated 61 lives in Massachusetts in 2018.
68% of nighttime fatalities are unrestrained in Massachusetts compared to 55% of unrestrained daytime fatalities.
