GHSA Chair to Testify Before Congress About U.S. Roadway Safety

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT: Adam Snider (GHSA), 202-580-7930, 202-365-8971 (cell)

Minnesota’s Mike Hanson will focus on the critical role states play in protecting everyone on the road

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In testimony before a key House of Representatives panel tomorrow, Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) Chair and Minnesota Office of Traffic Safety Director Mike Hanson will address ongoing and emerging traffic safety challenges and how to promote safer roads across the country. Hanson’s testimony comes as lawmakers gear up for next year’s Congressional reauthorization of the nation’s surface transportation programs that will address behavioral safety initiatives and overall transportation spending levels.

In his remarks before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Highways and Transit, Hanson will urge continued support for federal behavioral traffic safety programs run by State and Territorial Highway Safety Offices (SHSOs) and outline steps that can help build on recent safety successes, including but not limited to:

• Holistic safety-first approach. More than four million Americans have died in traffic crashes since 1900. Countless more have been injured. Traffic fatalities have risen 25% over the past decade. This roadway safety crisis demands a holistic approach that utilizes every proven strategy, including traffic enforcement, infrastructure improvements, vehicle technology, emergency medical services and more.
• Easing administrative burdens. Every SHSO must comply with onerous, duplicative reporting requirements and arbitrary funding restrictions that do not support – and often hamper – the goal of effective and efficient programs. Oversight and transparency are critical, but overly prescriptive regulatory burdens on SHSOs reduce the resources and time left to implement safety programs that save lives.
• Supporting traffic enforcement. Hanson, who served with the Minnesota State Patrol for 32 years, noted that traffic enforcement is crucial to addressing dangerous driving behaviors, like speeding and impaired driving, that endanger everyone on the road. There are numerous examples across the country of reductions in traffic enforcement leading to increases in traffic crashes and deaths. Traffic enforcement should be fair, data-based and focused on unsafe behavior behind the wheel.
• Promoting innovation. SHSOs are pioneering forward-looking and creative ways to address an array of interconnected roadway safety issues. But there are often roadblocks to innovation. Federal funding must be structured in a way that supports new technology developments, new data analysis and new safety countermeasures.

Traffic deaths have been declining modestly the past few years but are still well above five years ago. In 2023, the last year of complete data, there were 40,990 people killed in crashes – down 3.6% from the year before but still 12.7% higher than 2019. Drunk driving deaths have skyrocketed 33% in just three years, rising from 10,196 in 2019 to 13,524 in 2022. Pedestrian deaths reached a 40-year high in 2022, with drivers killing more than 7,500 people walking, before falling slightly after that.

You can watch a livestream of the hearing, titled “America Builds: A Review of Programs to Address Roadway Safety,” which is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, February 12, on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s website.

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