The South Central Connecticut Traffic Unit Regional Traffic Enforcement Team (SSCTU) has wrapped its first year with its mission to create safer roadways in its enforcement locations and to educate and establish positive interactions with motorists.

Led by sergeants Antonio De Pascale and Joseph Mulhern of the North Haven and East Haven police departments, the Enforcement Team is a collective consisting of the departments serving East Haven, North Haven, North Branford, Branford, Madison, and Guilford. The group convened after area chiefs, including North Branford Police Department Deputy Chief James Lovelace, became aware of a dramatic increase in fatal and non-fatal traffic accidents. Among the primary public safety goals to prevent excess accidents and other violations includes the education of regional motorists, through which close connections could be fostered and driving habits could be improved.

“You’re never going to arrest your way out of a problem. You’re going to give enough tickets away that you’ll never see those infractions again,” Deputy Chief Lovelace said. “The real way you change behavior is making positive connections with the community and then providing education and resources to go along with it.”

The unit reported 1,315 motor vehicle stops since its deployment on June 15, 2022, with 426 infractions issued, constituting one-third of all stops. Common violations contributing to that statistic include speeding, expired licenses and registrations, and accident-prone distracted or erratic driving behavior. Such violations, especially the latter, are among the most prevalent in the Shoreline area, according to Sgt. Mulhern.

“Any way we can do to prevent that — especially with the traffic team looking at those behaviors in also monitoring the speeds on certain roadways where we already know statistically that we have issues — that’s where our focus was in addressing those specific areas,” he said.

In executing enforcement, the six towns represented by the SCCTU issued plans to the team’s commanding officers regarding identified areas of concern for violations and what to be aware of when making a stop.

According to De Pascale, specific violations, their frequency, and predicted locations of occurrence varied from town to town. Violations depend upon factors such as differing municipal traffic regulations or road layouts.

“We learned that each town has a different dynamic,” De Pascale said. “The focus of the deployments in...North Haven or East Haven were different than towns such as Guilford or Madison both in volume and frequency of violations. We had to change the way we approached each town to use our manpower efficiently.”

“Every town has its needs, and I think they are all different. I don’t think any town was the same,” said Sgt. Mulhern. “The theory of going out and doing traffic enforcement was the same.”

In East Haven, the team’s officers found the residents had the highest number of unregistered drivers and vehicles of the six municipalities. Causes for violations, particularly those related to licenses and registration, were partly due to the coronavirus pandemic and the inability of citizens to renew mandated paperwork and credentials.

A stop made by an officer allowed for an instructive interaction with a driver, which could involve informing them of the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) current acceptance of online registration renewals. Officers sometimes handed motorists a written explanation detailing that virtual possibility or allowed motorists the opportunity to register by phone call during a stop.

“We realized that COVID hampered the ability for many people to get out to the DMV and renew registrations, licenses, etc,” said De Pascale. “We took this as an opportunity to advise them of their suspended status and guide them towards several different resources to get back to valid status.”

Mulhern said that the unit discovered these types of actions to be a key tactic in improving more informed and safer driving.

“We use LPR [License Plate Readers] technology, plate readers on the back of the vehicles, and we saw that after six, eight, 10 deployments, we start[ed] seeing a decrease in how many unregistered cars [were driving],” he said.

Education worked both ways, as citizen input influenced the enforcement team’s mission. Community members informed officers of additional locations where certain violations were of great concern and could endanger pedestrians. Many of these targeted locations were previously identified “hot spots” as determined by analytical data collected by the enforcement team and whose strategic positions were bolstered by the inclusion of information from residents.

“Those locations were based on phone calls we get from residents in the community, from other stakeholders, political figures in the community saying, ‘Hey, our constituents are saying we’re seeing an issue,’” Lovelace said. “Those became target areas to address not only our concerns but the community’s concerns. It’s really a partnership. The stronger the partnership you have, the better you’re able to address those issues.”

Traffic education found its way into the effort as well. Mulhern and Lovelace credited the cross-departmental collaboration between the town’s individual forces as an essential element in the team’s work, allowing officers to exchange case information, rely upon each others’ collective policing experience, and build closer relationships up to the highest rank.

“You’re always learning from the experiences of the veteran seniors, then you get the younger officers who have attended other trainings that bring something else back to the table,” said Mulhern. “That constant exchange of information is huge and definitely makes a positive impact.”

As it looks to the future, the unit is prepared to be more driven in its mission, looking for ways to constantly improve its work in accordance with the needs of the six SCCTU towns and the region.

“I think we know where we were last year, and I think we’ll come back with a different, proactive approach to address different issues in different towns,” said Mulhern. “We did certain things in East Haven, we did certain things in North Branford. Maybe next year, we’ll come up with ideas [that are] a little bit different. But you still have to go back to the main frame of why we’re out there. It’s to reduce the crashes and educate the people.”