Senate District 12 covers the east side of New Castle County both north and south of the C&D Canal. It extends east from Glasgow to the unincorporated communities of Wrangle Hill, Williamsburg, Kirkwood, Greylag, Bayview Manor and Monterey Farms all the way to the Delaware River, where it also includes the river towns of New Castle and Delaware City (north of the C&D Canal) and Port Penn (south of the C&D Canal). (If you are not 100% sure whether you live in Senate District 12, you can search here using your address.) If you live in this district your choice on November 8 to represent you in the Delaware Senate is between the incumbent Senator Nicole Poore and her challenger Bill Alexander. Using a multiple choice format, we asked these two candidates to share their views on four questions related to traffic safety in Delaware. Here’s how they answered:
1) In May the 151st Delaware General Assembly voted unanimously to approve the Everyone Gets Home resolution (SCR 94). SCR94 called for reducing traffic fatalities in Delaware to no more than 100 people each year and tasked state agencies to meet that goal by 2025.
Alexander: “Progress in reducing traffic fatalities is possible and elected state officials have an important role to play in holding state agencies accountable for meeting traffic safety goals.“
Poore: “Progress in reducing traffic fatalities is possible and elected state officials have an important role to play in holding state agencies accountable for meeting traffic safety goals.“
2) There is significant disagreement among transportation professionals about how limited resources for government traffic safety efforts should be allocated.
Alexander: “Resources should be allocated to reducing all types of crashes (property damage, injury and fatal).“
Poore: “All types of crashes need to be addressed but greater resources should be allocated to reducing fatal crash types compared to property damage and injury crashes.”
3) Traffic safety professionals often describe their work in terms of the ‘3 Es’ (education, enforcement and engineering).
Alexander: “All 3 Es – education, enforcement and engineering – are indispensable and we need to do more of each in order to make progress in solving Delaware’s traffic safety crisis.“
Poore: “All 3 Es – education, enforcement and engineering – are indispensable and we need to do more of each in order to make progress in solving Delaware’s traffic safety crisis.“
4) Many of Delaware’s deadliest roads – including Dupont Highway, Coastal Highway, Kirkwood Highway and Pulaski Highway – have become deadlier over time as commercial development along those roads has increased the number of potential conflicts between vehicles, and between vehicles and pedestrians, entering and exiting driveways and changing lanes either to enter or after exiting driveways.
Alexander: “DelDOT should partner with counties to consolidate driveway entrances and exits onto busy, high-speed, multi-lane highways.”
Poore: “DelDOT should partner with counties to consolidate driveway entrances and exits onto busy, high-speed, multi-lane highways.“
5) Is there anything else about your record as an elected official, your experience or your views that you think is relevant to improving traffic safety in Delaware for the people you wish to represent in the 152nd General Assembly?
Alexander: “I have been a champion for traffic safety for over four decades. Having retired from the Delaware State Police after 25 years of service, I witnessed first-hand the atrocities associated with serious motor vehicle collisions, and walked the scenes of dozens of fatal crashes over my career. My last assignment as a Captain was Director of Traffic Operations. In this role, I learned the acute details of the causes and effects of traffic crashes, and developed strategies to reduce fatalities on Delaware’s roadways, in partnership with other agencies. Also, I have been a certified defensive driving course instructor since 1988, and I am Managing Director of Interstate Training Alliance,LLC, which specializes in crash reduction training.
Last year in Delaware, we had 139 traffic deaths and 8,255 people injured. Total crashes were up 17% from the previous year, and so far 2022 isn’t looking so great either. Clearly, there are numerous driver behaviors causing this, but the single biggest issue in Delaware (and nationwide) is the ever-growing rate of inattentive driving related to texting while driving. So what’s being done? Obviously not enough, and that’s NOT acceptable.
From my experience, and research, I assert that strong penalties and staunch enforcement are the keys to making Delaware’s roads safer. We’ve been weak on traffic issues in Delaware, and need to—
o Target the real problem violators. I’m not talking about the person going a mile or two over the limit on their way to work, nor the person who forgot to get his/her tag renewed by a few days. We need to focus resources on those traffic problems posing real dangers, taking lives away, and putting people in the hospital, such as inattentive driving and excessive speeding.
o Ensure police agencies are given more resources. There are ways to do this without sacrificing manpower, and I can assure you that I can make it happen because I’ve done it before on numerous occasions.
When elected, you can rest assured that I will make traffic safety a priority, work with partner agencies to effectively augment traffic safety in Delaware, and take back our roadways to make them safer for all of us.”