If you drove in the city of Pembroke on Friday, Jan. 18, then you probably saw firsthand how the city is stepping up efforts to promote traffic safety. Throughout the evening, Pembroke police officers set up numerous check points in the city in an attempt to make an impact on areas of the city that were identified as having high traffic violations.
PPD Sgt. Billy Gray said this is just the first of many similar operations.
Thirteen officers, including three K-9 officers from neighboring counties, monitored a checkpoint that moved to three different locations – Hwy. 280, Hwy. 119 and Ashbranch Road. The officers then split up and individually monitored other areas of the city.
Gray said setup areas were designated based on roads that have received the most complaints from residents and have had the most violations issued on.
"Our main objective was to slow people down and enforce child safety restraint laws," Gray said. "Overall, I was kind of surprised how many violations we observed in just a short period of time. We all came away from this feeling like we need to do it more often in order to get a better handle on this issue."
In the six hour span the operation took place, 46 citations were issued and eight arrests were made.
Among the violations were: two wanted men found, four individuals charged with drugs, seven child safety restraint violations, four seat belt violations, eleven charges of either invalid or expired driver’s license, two no insurance violations, three open container charges, six moving violations – such as speeding or improper lane change, six defective equipment violations – such as broken tail light or burnt out headlight.
In addition, 16 warnings were issued and PPD Officer Daniel Woodcock, who is a certified child restraint technician, instructed many drivers on the proper use of child safety seats.
Gray said the department will continue to monitor complaints and traffic in order to identify the problem areas as they plan for the road checks in Pembroke.