DUI arrests by Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station deputies dipped for the second straight year, said Sgt. Rich Cohen, head of the station’s Traffic Division, but deputies plan to keep up their enforcement efforts.

There were 660 DUI arrests in 2012, there were 639 in 2011 and 431 last year, marking a steady decline.

“We are glad that the number has come down — however, that number is not low enough,” Cohen said. “We’re shooting for zero.”

Roughly the same number of DUI arrests were made daily in Los Angeles County during the December 2012 holiday period as in 2011, according to data from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

The county’s 100 law enforcement agencies made 2,168 drunk-driving arrests during the 17 days from Dec. 14 to Jan. 1, or 127.5 per day. A year earlier, 2,433 arrests were made over 19 days, or 128 per day.

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Sheriff officials say police agencies across the county will conduct special DUI operations on Super Bowl Sunday in February and during St. Patrick’s Day festivities in March.

“DUI checkpoints, along with regularly scheduled high visibility DUI enforcement, are proven strategies with the goal of removing impaired drivers from the road and heightening awareness of the dangers of driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol,” Sheriff’s Department officials said in a statement.

“According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, sobriety checkpoint programs can yield considerable cost savings: $6 for every $1 spent,” the statement read.

“We’re having another DUI checkpoint Jan. 18 from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m.,” Cohen said.

Funding for the special holiday DUI enforcement was provided by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration via the California Office of Traffic Safety.

To contact the Sheriff’s Station: 

• Article: SCV Sheriff’s Station Deputies See Decline In DUI Arrests
  
• Article Source: Newsroom
• Author: Perry Smith