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Teenagers Promote Safe Driving Among Youth

Posted on: Wednesday, 7 September 2005, 06:00 CDT

HAMILTON -- It's 6:15 p.m. on a Wednesday evening and the parking lot of the Butler County 4-H extension office on Princeton Road is packed.

The occasion is a meeting of CarTeens -- a program taught by teen volunteers to educate and promote safe driving among youth.

Following a rash of teen driving fatalities in 2003 and 2004, the program became an integral part of a county-based task force formed to curb the rising death toll. As part of that effort, the courts - - in addition to imposing stiffer penalties and fines -- mandated participation in the CarTeens program to first-time teen driving offenders.

Students must complete the three-hour course and pass a test to be considered in the good graces of the courts again.

Parents are now required to attend the program with their teens.

"It's been real positive for us to have the parents being mandated to come with their sons and daughters," said James Jordan, director of the program.

On a recent summer evening, 16-year-old Adam Leighton and his father, David, were among the more than 30 in attendance.

"I caused an accident," said the Bishop Fenwick High School student of reason why he had to be there.

He failed to yield at a stop sign and collided with another motorist.

"He was going 50 and I was going 15," Adam Leighton said. "It was a near fatal accident."

For the next three hours Adam and his father listened with others as teen coordinators -- like 18-year-old Dean Blakely -- attempted to educate them on the potential perils of driving.

Blakely, who has volunteered with the program for two years, was initially required to attend because of a speeding violation. Nearly half of the teens are referred for that offense.

"I've heard of kids going 90 miles an hour on (Route) 129," he said.

"It amazes me that anyone would even want to go that fast. I hope that we have shown them once they get through the program the consequences of what can happen while they're going that fast."

Badin High School senior Joe Ehler was required by the courts to talk to CarTeen participants about a fatal crash in which he was charged with vehicular homicide.

Every Wednesday, he talks about the details of the Nov. 22, 2004, accident in which Hamilton resident Dan Eckman was killed.

He recalled the moment he awoke in a hospital room to see his parents after the crash.

"The look on their faces was of utter horror," Ehler continued. "... They all came to talk to me. They told me that ... I hit a man head-on and he was dead. I couldn't take it. I broke down."

No days passes that Eckman's family isn't in his thoughts, Ehler told the teens.

"You might think you look cool speeding around, but you don't," Ehler said. "You guys can learn from this and do anything you want, but for me -- I'm just left picking up the pieces of my life and trying to put it together into anything I can. Please don't end up like me."

For Adam Leighton, Ehler's story struck a nerve. "I thought it was powerful," he said. "You could see the damage that the choices we make can cause."

Source: Cincinnati Post

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