April is Distracted Driving Month, and the New York Municipal Insurance Reciprocal (NYMIR) has posed a challenge to its 880 member counties and local governments.
Nationally, distracted driving has been the leading cause of motor vehicle crashes. In 2014, the Official U.S. Government website for Distracted Driving reported that 3,179 people were killed and 431,000 injured in moving vehicle accidents. Vehicle claims represent a significant concern for insurers and local governments, and preventing distracted driving can boost your risk management efforts.
NYMIR is providing a free service of risk management seminars to provide train-the-trainer instruction for distracted driving classes to prepare your own employees as instructors. These training sessions can be provided by NYMIR Risk Management staff either regionally or at your municipality.
For more information contact NYMIR Vice President of Marketing and Member Services, Susan O'Rorke at 518-292-0057.
"Unfortunately, distracted driving takes too many lives and causes too many accidents in our communities. As local government officials, we need to do whatever we can do to keep our families and colleagues safe on our roadways. Training and educating others of this preventable danger can only help save more lives [from] being lost to distracted driving," said Sally Deming of Herkimer County; who lost her husband, in the performance of his duties, due to a motorist who failed to follow the law and "Move Over" on the NYS Thruway in 2016.
