Seat Belt Crackdown Begins Monday In East Windsor

EAST WINDSOR, NJ — Officers from the East Windsor Police Department will be joining their colleagues from around the country in cracking down on unbuckled motorists and passengers as part of the national “Click it or Ticket” campaign.

Beginning Monday, through June 4, the annual “Click It or Ticket” national mobilization begins. The campaign uses high-visibility seat belt checkpoints and saturation patrols, in combination with local and national publicity efforts, to reiterate the life-saving value of seat belts.

In 2022, 694 people were killed in traffic crashes in the Garden State, according to the New Jersey Division of Highway Traffic Safety. The same data notes that 40 percent of the motor vehicle occupants who died in these crashes were not wearing a seat belt.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that using seat belts reduces the risk of serious injury or death in a crash by 45 percent.

In New Jersey, the focus of this year’s Click It or Ticket campaign is to promote seat belt usage by adults in all seating positions in the vehicle, both front and rear seats.

The front seat belt usage rate in New Jersey currently stands at 92.97, officials said. However, adults riding in rear seats are buckling up at a significantly lower rate - 48 percent according to the most recent surveys.

“Too many New Jerseyans needlessly lose their lives due to motor vehicle-related fatalities, and reducing these preventable deaths is a top priority for my office,” Attorney General Matthew Platkin said in a statement.

“Our campaign will help raise awareness of this critical and proven way of preventing serious injury or death in the event of a motor vehicle crash. Seat belts save lives – it’s that simple.”

During the 2022 Click it or Ticket campaign, 145 New Jersey police agencies participated in the two-week initiative. During that time law enforcement officers issued 8,373 seat belt citations, 3,315 speeding summonses and made 278 impaired driving arrests.

Here's a list of Mercer County towns participating in this year's program and the grant money they received, as per AG's office:

• East Windsor: $7,000
• Ewing: $7,000
• Hamilton: $8,750
• Hightstown: $7,000
• Hopewell: $7,000
• West Windsor $7,000

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