Travis County Commissioners Court
August 12, 2008
Item 25
>> 25 is to consider and take appropriate action on the following, a, request from the Travis County sheriff's office to establish a working relationship with the colorado state patrol family foundation in order to offer the alive at 25 defensive driving course to the Travis County community. And 25-b, splistation of grants and private funding for financial support of the alive at 25 program. And 25-c, request to offer the program to Travis County residents as an equal partner in the multi-agency Travis County alive team. Afternoon.
>> good afternoon. John brady, we're safety consultants for the county.
>> under shrinking prevention program, county attorney's office.
>> (indiscernible), I represent the Travis County sheriff's office.
>> okay.
>> the alive at 25 program, we gave a presentation back at April and we were offering parent portion on that program. Since learning more about it and its effectiveness and success in other states, we wanted to bring it to travisnr county. Colorado over the past seven years has experienced a 78 percent decrease in teen fatalities. Number one cause for fatalities in this age group, 16 to 24, are car crashes. This is a behavior-based defensive driving course developed by the nationalv safety council. Currently have the eanes school district on board to carry it this fall. And mike is working with a couple of other schools to bring it to them as soon as possible be. Focusing primarily on Travis County right now. We have a lot of exielt throughout the team, the Austin, Austin Travis County e.m.s., cap metro, txdot, got a listing there underneath the summary of all the variousnr agencies, Travis County attorney's office is supportive. And we're looking for your support, and in order to offer this we need to enter into a working arrangement with the colorado state patrol family foundation. They originated the program originally in colorado. We're the first to offer it. They've had the most success. We want to follow theirnrxd modelc'n offering it here. In order to do that, we need to enter into a subagency agreement with them. They will be certifying our instructors, which will be primary to law enforcement only, and that's again their model. They have agreed to have secondary instructors, e.m.s. Personnel. So they're looking for people who have experience out on the streets and can speak from experience to the teens.
>> so the foundation is what kind of organization?
>> they are nonprofit foundation that was founded -- they're a public safety entity that was founded by the state patrol, the colorado state patrol for the purpose of providing public safety classes in colorado.
>> okay. So folks affiliated with the colorado state patrol?
>> yes, sir.
>> so we're just asked to approve the program basically.
>> basically, and that we sign into these agreements because they are contractual.
>> and funding is from all state?
>> we are looking at a number of different funding opportunities. In other programs that have begun, allstate has been a big supporter. South carolina started last February and allstate donated 50,000. We're in talks with a number of different companies for funding. We have interest, unfortunately their fiscal years, we kind of came in in the middle of this. We wanted to get it going for the next school year, which we're just a couple of weeks away from. So we've got some verbal promises, but we're still in the process of negotiating this.
>> okay.
>> but this will be entirely private funds, grants, donations.
>> and what is c about?
>> the multi-agency team that theni sheriff's officers classes, some of the administrative duties that we're -- that are required to hold the team together, meetings, things of that nature, that we act as equal partners within that team. So the time that a.p.d. Is donating officers for training and donating their time for the training and certification process that we're doing the same thing with our officers, just act as equal members of that team.
>> okay. Questions?
>> I have a do you mean. The outreach as far as who will be selected to participate in the program, the age group, I guess, and also if there is any agreement if the person that you are trying to recruit to participate in this particular program, how will that be done?
>> I was going to take the lead. We started -- we were here first, as I told john, with the concern for teen driving in Travis County. And when I met with john, we put all our resources together and all of our connections that we've had within all the seven school districts within Travis County to make this work. So when we are soliciting or advertising the program, we will rely on the people that we work with within all the schools over the past few years to go ahead and make sure that we have an outreach that covers the entire community. Correct me if I'm wrong, but right now we are not set up to do a blanket, here's the program, anybody sign up. We're going to take it oneu step at a time. When we are ready to go out there, my program will work with john because we work in the schools everyday to make sure that we are soliciting every teen, finding everybody that we need to find within Travis County to be able to serve them.
>> the second question is that are you going to follow the model that's been set aside up in colorado as far as volume is concerned after you get this thing started? What is the overall -- not the objective, but what is the ultimate goal, I guess, to look as far as attaining to make sure that you have enough persons that you feel that will make a difference in what you're trying to accomplish here with this particular program?
>> the ultimate goal to present this to the legislature at some point and make it part of thed license program that's currently --
>> what now?
>> the graduated license program.
>> where you have to go through alive at 25 in order to get your license at 15 or 16?
>> exactly. And that's what's occur with great success.
>> and you have to add that eanes isd had the idea, they are going to try to attach this to getting a parking permit for high school seniorsp=9(=n nnrnijfxdjfi]-9hi
>>
>>
>>
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>> that's where you get your certificate saying you've completed the program so they'll know how many students you've had.
>> it's a lot more specific than ab and c, though. I think those should be brought to us individually for action.
>> okay.
>> I'm just looking at the -- to establish a working relationship with the colorado patrol.
>> copies of the three agreements are included in your backup.
>> pursuant to a.
>> I think we ought to approve these as agreements.
>> and you can do it either way. We can put it on for an agenda item for next week ore take appropriate actions on agreements 1, two, three.
>> I can do it individually. I don't know that y'all necessarily have to come back down here,nr but I will list them as part of the agenda if we're doing them.
>> okay.
>> I interpret a as being a lot more general than our specific agreements.
>> I think you could go either way on it. I'm not going to push you to approve them now if you want them on next week's agenda. That works just as well for me as doing them now.
>> if you don't push me, I don't push back.
>> [ laughter ]
>> any more discussion? We may need nem them for consent if they're straightforward.
>> just so we know we have if not the high ef, but one of the highest arrest rates for d.w.i. In the state, so this could go a long way to aiding that. That's saying something that we have one of the highest if not the highest arrest rate in the state for d.w.i.
>> in Austin we do.
>> it's the right thing to do and the right thing to do rightly. All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Y'all very much.
>> thank you.
>> thank you very much.
>> okay.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, August 12, 2008 1:37 PM