RICHMOND - If your organization's passion is making a difference in your community and you want to save lives, consider applying for a highway safety grant from the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Grants allow Virginia-based law enforcement agencies, nonprofit organizations, state and local government agencies and colleges and universities to implement innovative programs and campaigns aimed at preventing and reducing traffic fatalities, injuries and crashes in Virginia.
Interested applicants may apply between February 1 - 28, 2023, and are required to complete a grant application training course. Workshops begin in January 2023. For information about the course, guidelines for grant applications and access to the application, contact the DMV program manager in your area.
Grant-funded programs strive to increase seat belt use; decrease speeding; prevent drunk, drugged, drowsy or distracted driving; or promote motorcyclist, pedestrian, bicyclist, teen or senior driver safety. Objectives to measure the initiative's effectiveness are required, and funding is determined by the potential impact on these established performance objectives. Applications for programs that include Virginians of various cultures and ethnicities are encouraged. More information is available online.
Approved applications will receive funding from October 1, 2023 through September 30, 2024. Applicants participate on a cost-reimbursement basis.
Here are three examples of grant-funded projects:
- A local law enforcement agency provides high-visibility enforcement (HVE) of alcohol-related traffic laws, including checkpoints and saturation patrols, to combat drunk driving crashes, injuries and fatalities. The agency evaluates the crash data in its locality, including where and at what times of day the most incidents occur, and forms an HVE plan based on the data.
- Through VCU Health's GR-ACY (Get Real-About Choices and Consequences for You) education and prevention program, participants glean the knowledge of various trauma center roles, including physicians, nurses, social workers, chaplains, and local law enforcement. Following the observational experience, each participates in simulation activities to reinforce the consequences of impaired driving. For Fiscal Year 2022, 76 individuals completed the GR-ACY program. This is an increase of 32% over previous years.
- Street Smart is a pedestrian and bicycle safety public awareness campaign in northern Virginia. Paid advertising displays on buses, at bus stops and bus shelters, on gas pump toppers and through social media, while law enforcement agencies spend overtime hours enforcing pedestrian and bicycle traffic laws, all at the end of Daylight Saving Time when incidents tend to be most frequent.