OHIO:Traffic grant focuses on safer driving

http://www.tribtoday.com/page/content.detail/id/548147/Traffic-grant-focuses-on-safer-driving.html?nav=5021 Traffic grant focuses on safer driving October 12, 2010 - By JOSHUA S. FLESHER Tribune Chronicle Save | Comments (3) | Post a comment | FOWLER - A $34,397 federal traffic safety grant awarded last week to Fowler comes at a time when Trumbull County has been particularly hard hit with fatal accidents.

''We just had four in four days,'' said Ohio State Highway Patrolman Sgt. Randy Skaggs.

The 2011 Trumbull County Safe Communities grant will focus efforts on safe driving, such as seat belt restraint, impaired driving, motorcycle safety and young drivers.

The grant, obtained through an application by Fowler patrol officer Melissa Herlinger, will allow the small department to work with representatives from the Ohio State Patrol, Trumbull County Engineer's Office, Trumbull County Coroner's Office, St. Joseph Health Center, Trumbull Memorial Hospital and First Place Bank.

Other projects being undertaken through similar grants include passing out information during Howland's Safety Day this weekend and encouraging people to not drink and drive over the Halloween weekend by distributing napkins at local bars bearing their message of safe driving.

Trumbull County ranks in the top 10 of Ohio's 88 counties for traffic fatalities.

In the past week, accidents have claimed the lives of Blaine Szalaj, 62, of Berlin Center who died Saturday when his 1995 BMW motorcycle crashed into a 2000 Chevrolet Silverado on Hoagland Blackstub and state Route 88 in Mecca; Leland C. Gaumer, 59, of North Canton who died Thursday in a crash at the intersection of state Routes 5 and 534 in Braceville; Jermaine McDonald, 26, of Warren who was killed in a crash on U.S. Route 422 on Wednesday; and Ashley Jerina, 20, of Newton Falls, who died Saturday after a crash on Palmyra Road near Kibler Toot Road in Warren Township.

The driver of that vehicle, Nathan Ferris of Newton Falls, remains in St. Elizabeth Health Center in Youngstown in stable condition.

Skaggs said the patrol and law enforcement do everything they can, from high visibility enforcement to enforcement action, but the accidents are all caused by differing reasons and in different parts of the county.

''They're all various reasons, speed, failure to yield,'' Skaggs said.