Zero Tolerance
You drink, you lose
By MARK HENDERSON Deputy Sheriff's Office & Governors Office of Highway Safety

Impaired drivers, The Governor's Office of Highway Safety (GOHS) has a message for you this Independence Day weekend. "If You Drink and Drive, You'll Lose." Georgia law enforcement officers from Operation Zero-Tolerance (OZT) will be out in full force this holiday travel period, and if you're drinking and driving, they'll be looking for you.

State Troopers, police, and sheriff's deputies will setup saturation patrols and sobriety checkpoints across the state where you least expect them. Drivers who are checked will simply receive safety brochures, but motorists who are caught driving drunk or drugged will go to jail.

GOHS will mobilize officers from more than 500 law enforcement agencies throughout the state for OZT duty. Impaired drivers cause more than a third of Georgia's total traffic fatalities each year. Last year, that translated into a human cost of more than 500 funerals for Georgia families.

For drivers stopped after drinking or using drugs, being caught, arrested, and prosecuted can cost thousands of dollars for defense and fines. You can lose your car, your license, and your liberty if the charge is vehicular homicide. So, your local law enforcement agencies urge you, if you plan to party, plan first for a designated driver, plan to take a taxi, or plan to spend the night.

"You drive impaired, you WILL go to jail." And this year, the OZT campaign is part of the One Hundred Days of Summer Heat initiative launched by the Governor's Office of Highway Safety. Summer Heat will run through the end of the Labor Day holiday travel period in September. High profile patrols are scheduled all summer long to raise safe driver awareness, especially about the deadly consequences of speed.

Summer Heat is supported across the state by the Georgia Sheriff's Association, the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, and the Georgia State Patrol.