Increased Enforcement By The OSHP This Month

(WHBC) – The Ohio State Highway Patrol’s Canton Post is increasing enforcement efforts in February.

Troopers are utilizing funding from a Federal Highway Traffic Safety Grant to focus on reducing crashes in Stark County.

The highway patrol and area law enforcement agencies are focusing their efforts at removing impaired drivers from Stark County roadways and enforcing traffic laws directly related to crash causing violations.

Special attention is being placed on distracted driving, failure to yield and safety belt violations.

Additional resources that are being utilized in February include the Ohio State Patrol’s aviation and commercial vehicle inspection sections.

The highway patrol says, while traffic fatalities were down in Ohio last year, they were up in Stark County.

1,071 people lost their lives in traffic accidents across the state in 2018, a decrease of 9-percent from 2017.

However, in Stark County, 39 people were killed in crashes last year, ten more than in 2017.