President’s Corner

by Kelly Dagenhart, RID OR/AC President

Court Watch Data

I went to the State of Tennessee Highway Safety Grant Workshop (this oversees special federal highways funds administered by the state) on March 2, at the Strawberry Plains Highway Center. This workshop was brought to my attention by Attorney General Jim Ramsey. The workshop gave the requirements for applying for funds and how they are administered.

We decided at the RID Board Meeting the following Tuesday that our most pressing need was to improve the collection and analysis of DUI data. Kathy Miller took our general wishes for a combined Anderson County/RID project to Barry Pellzzari, Anderson County Circuit Court Clerk. Our thoughts were that the three-year declining funding cycle could fund a project that would provide much improved data collection and analysis using mostly state funds. Pellzzari said that the state was presently funding a project to develop improved data handling in the state and that counties with no computer data handling now would be funded first. That puts us several years down the road before Anderson County’s System is improved. He was not interested in working to get an intermediate system going in cooperation with RID. We are presently trying to find out what the State of Tennessee’s schedule is and exactly what its new system will accomplish. We should know then whether we should try to influence its design so that we can get our data needs met also.

Board Status

The Oak Ridge RID has nine of its fifteen authorized board positions filled, leaving six positions that are vacant. If you are interested or if you know of anyone who might be interested in becoming a RID board member, please contact Kelly Dagenhart at 865-483-8801. RID has a working board. RID board members are expected to contribute to the organization’s activities as well as attend board meetings.

RID Web Site

Our RID chapter has had a website active since last fall and has slowly been building up material on the site. The web address is www.korrnet.org/ridorac. Our webmaster is Buford Carter. We intend to add more DUI traffic statistics not available on any of the other volunteer, state or traffic safety sites. Our Court Watch Manual will soon be on the site. We invite comments on how to improve the web site.