The police departments of Irvine and Garden Grove run sobriety checkpoints Saturday night.
Irvine’s is scheduled from 8:30 p.m. through 2 a.m. in the area of Jamboree Road and Michelson Drive, according to the department.
Garden Grove PD did not disclose the location of its checkpoint that begins at 9 p.m. Saturday.
The Newport Beach Police Department announced it will hold a sobriety stop on Thursday, Dec. 27.
At the checkpoints, officers will be looking for signs of alcohol and/or drug impairment by drivers as well as checking for proper licensing.
Those three police departments as well as Santa Ana’s are also taking part in the high-visibility enforcement campaign Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over, which runs from through Jan. 1.
As part of the effort, those police departments will have more officers than usual on the roads specifically looking for impaired drivers.
At the checkpoints, officers will be looking for signs of alcohol and/or drug impairment by drivers as well as checking for proper licensing.
Each cop shop reminds drivers that “DUI Doesn’t Just Mean Booze,” as marijuana, prescription drugs and over-the-counter medications can also be impairing, especially in combination with alcohol or other drugs.
The reason for the enforcement? During the 2017 Christmas (Dec. 22-25) and New Year’s (Dec. 30-Jan. 2) holiday periods, 25 people were killed and 643 were injured on California roads, according to data from the California Highway Patrol Statewide Integrated Traffic Records System.
Funding for impaired driving enforcement operations are provided to each department from California Office of Traffic Safety grants, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.