Local police departments awarded federal highway safety grants

SALISBURY, Md. – The Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration has announced over $12 million in federal highway safety grants, and the Salisbury University and Ocean Pines police departments are among the recipients. Officials said the funding will help improve road safety on Delmarva.

Busy agencies on the Eastern Shore, like the Salisbury University Police Department (SUPD), plan on using the funding to address the offenses and accidents they see most of, including texting and driving.

According to Capt. Christopher Stockley of the SUPD, the extra funding will allow them to increase enforcement in specific areas and make the campus safer.

“Annually, we put in for this funding, and we concentrate our enforcement on pedestrian crosswalk and distracted driving, as well as cell phone use around campus,” Capt. Christopher Stockley said.

Ocean Pines Police Chief Tim Robinson said the extra funding will allow his department to place more officers on the roads so they can control speeding and the number of drivers under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

“When the money is given to the local agencies like ours, we use that for extra shifts where officers can go out dedicated for speed enforcement or DUI patrols, looking for people that are drinking and driving,” Chief Robinson said.

His department also plans on purchasing more mobile roadside devices that monitor speeding.

“Currently we have one mobile device that we put around throughout Ocean Pines that allows people to know how fast they’re going, and that thing has a waiting list– That is a very popular piece of equipment here in this jurisdiction.”

The federal grants complement the state of Maryland’s Vision Zero initiative, a strategy that sets the goal of zero traffic fatalities and serious injuries by the year 2030.