NWH likes roadside safety checks

Pour another cup of coffee and read (maybe even re-read) today's front-page article in the Northwest Herald about roadside safety checks.

For the record, I am against them. The net result of arrests for serious traffic offensestells me that they are intrusive and a waste of time and money. Be sure to vote in the polls here and at the bottom of the newspaper's homepage (why do they put the poll at the bottom of the page, where few readers will find it?).

As I previously wrote in a different article, only four DUI arrests were made during the checkpoint manned by deputies and police officers. According to the paper, MCSD is sucking up $37,500/year for each of four years. That's $150,000!!! It has to run 10 seatbelt checkpoints, 7 roadside safety checkpoints and 20 "saturated" patrols in the 12 months from October 1 to September 30.

I'm not sure about the reporter's math, because he wrote that a detail costs "about $1,000 to $1,500". If you run 37 events and receive $37,500, that's a $1,000 average. Yes, some cost less and some more, but the range is not $1,000-1,500. My first question is, are the events conducted (staffed for street operations and related court time) so that the annual cost does not exceed the $37,500 received? Why do I doubt it?

The defense attorneys don't like "fishing expeditions." I don't, either.

How about this statement from former MCSD Undersheriff Gene Lowery, now Deputy Chief at the Crystal Lake P.D.? "It's narrow-minded to believe that these are ways for police to eliminate probable cause." Any citizen conscious of his legal rights will hate that position, and that's from a #2 at what might be the county's largest municipal police department.

And this one? "Those who voice concerns about them ("roadside safety checkpoints") more often than not are people who have been cited or arrested during the checks." The same Gene Lowery said that! I doubt it!

Only the amount of the State grant to the sheriff's department was mentioned. There would have been grants to the Crystal Lake Police Department and the Crystal Lake Park District Police for their participation, if CLPDP did participate in that particular late-night foray into the pockets of 40+ drivers.