Expect more impaired driving checkpoints this month

Charlottetown police are pooling resources with other P.E.I. police forces in an effort to catch more impaired drivers.

Const. Tim Keizer, a member of Charlottetown police's Community Action Team, said the last few years have been discouraging, because the number of impaired drivers on the road does not appear to be changing.

"There hasn't been the decline, and we're not seeing the rewards that we saw back in the '80s and '90s with the education that was going out there into the public," said Keizer.

"We're still seeing that there's still a large instance of impaired driving within the city of Charlottetown."

Police are responding by stepping up enforcement, he said.

"We are having more checkpoints. You are going to see police on the roadways more," said Keizer.

Keizer also called on Islanders to remain vigilant and continue to report erratic driving that could be caused by impairment.

The number of those calls to police increased by more than 10 per cent from 2018 to 2020, from 394 to 439. Those calls led to 69 charges in 2018 and 77 last year.

So far in 2021, there have been 447 calls leading to 65 charges.

Charlottetown faces a particular problem in terms of educating drivers about the dangers of impaired driving, said Keizer, because people come into the city from all over.

"The city of Charlottetown, where we are the hub of P.E.I., we have very transient drivers," he said.

"When we stop a vehicle, probably only 50 per cent of the drivers that we have interactions with are residents of the city."

In addition to more checkpoints, the city is also training more officers in impairment detection techniques. That is also helping with detecting people impaired by cannabis, or a combination of cannabis and alcohol, Keizer said.