The highways of Colorado are set to see heightened enforcement of seat belt laws as the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) collaborates with the Colorado State Patrol and 38 local law enforcement agencies. This first enforcement period of the Click It or Ticket campaign in 2025 starts today, April 7, and runs through April 13, spotlighting the recent expansion of seat belt mandates to include teens up to 18 years old, according to CDOT. To correct the lax seat belt usage among teenagers, patrols will be on the lookout, poised to issue citations not just to drivers who shun the seat belt but those with unbuckled passengers as well.
This campaign marks the first concerted push following a January 1 law update raising the former 16-year-old threshold to 18 for mandatory seat belt use. The law makes it a primary offense to drive with underage passengers who are not properly secured, granting officers the authority to make stops based solely on that infraction. A compiled CDOT graph from the Fatal Crash Data dashboard shows a concerning trend of traffic fatalities among unrestrained teenagers from 2019-2024, a reality that the enforcement efforts aim to turn around. In last year's enforcement periods, 159 teen violations and 96 adult violations for unrestrained children were recorded, evidencing the necessity for ongoing vigilance, as noted by the CDOT's Office of Transportation Safety Director Darrell Lingk, who said, "Seat belts are essential for protecting everyone on the road," as per CDOT.
An additional development seen this year is the update to Colorado’s child restraint system regulations. Now, children under nine are required to be in a car seat or booster seat, with those under two and below 40 pounds necessitating a rear-facing car seat, bolstering the safety measures from the earlier one-year and 20-pound requirements. CDOT advocates a broader culture of seat belt usage, as underscored by the state's 2024 Seat Belt Survey, which indicated an 88.19% usage rate, trailing the national average of 91.9% reported by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in 2023.
The Click It or Ticket initiative runs parallel to Distracted Driving Awareness Month, reinforcing the synergy between unfaltering attention behind the wheel and the indispensable act of buckling up. Under the new hands-free law, also now in effect, Colorado drivers are prompted even more to put their phones aside and keep their eyes on the road. In conjunction with these measures, the importance of correct car seat use cannot be overstated. CarSeatsColorado.com reveals, from more than 5,000 checks conducted last year, a 66% rate of misuse, a statistic driving home the need for better parental and caregiver compliance with passenger safety laws.
