GLENDALE, Ariz. — If you're heading into the West Valley soon, you may see a few more officers on the roadways. Here's why.
Several police chiefs from departments across the West Valley are joining together for a new initiative to try and reduce the number of speeding incidents in the cities. Representatives from several police departments held a news conference Wednesday to announce the new "Safe Speeds Save Lives" campaign.
According to Glendale police, the campaign will include new traffic initiatives in neighboring cities that will continue through July. A new traffic enforcement task force will be used during the initiative.
Surprise Police Chief Benny Piña was at the news conference to discuss the new project.
"We will be focusing on one of the stretches of road in one of the cities and taking all of our traffic resources," Pina said.
When analyzing recent traffic data for West Valley cities, officials noticed an influx of incidents occurring around the same time across several cities. More interestingly, many of those incidents involved speeding on certain stretches of roads.
The heads of nine police agencies meet routinely, according to a Glendale Police spokesman, and noticed that they always had traffic issues in common.
They've tried DUI patrols in the past, which is similar, they said. Under the new enforcement, agencies will, in effect, pool their resources. Traffic cops from one city can converge on an intersection in a different city to look for speeders or aggressive drivers.
"We're going with a heavy enforcement, zero tolerance approach so we can affect some of the collisions that are occurring," Piña said.
“We won't announce when we're hitting a particular stretch of road until we've already begun that effort," he said. "We will look at the data to make certain that we're being effective."
“They want to get aggressive, they want to start tailgating," Peoria Sgt. Ricardo Acevado said. "[The] number's 40 … people are doing 70. That's a problem."
Piña also asked the public to have a little more patience and practice safe driving skills when traveling in the West Valley.
The agencies involved in the task force are:
- Arizona Department of Public Safety
- Avondale Police Department
- Buckeye Police Department
- El Mirage Police Department
- Glendale Police Department
- Goodyear Police Department
- Maricopa County Sheriff's Office
- Peoria Police Department
- Surprise Police Department
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