[ OUR OPINION ]

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Time to get tougher
on drunken driving

THE ISSUE Hawaii's number of alcohol-related traffic fatalities increased by more than half in 2003 from the previous year.

STRONG laws against drunken driving are in place in Hawaii but alcohol-related fatalities in the state nevertheless soared last year. In response, state and county officials are planning to maintain sobriety checkpoints, used previously during holidays, throughout the year. Unable to provide blanket police protection, the government should increase its effort to urge traffic sobriety through the media.

While Hawaii's total traffic fatalities rose slightly from 119 in 2002 to 135 last year, drunken-driving deaths skyrocketed from 47 to 74. The share of Hawaii's traffic deaths caused by alcohol was about 40 percent in 2002, similar to the national average in both years.

The increase in alcohol-related fatalities rose by 53 percent in 2003. No other state's increase was even close; Idaho, Nevada and Rhode Island were the only other states where drunken-driving fatalities rose by double-digit percentages.

Scott Ishikawa, spokesman for the state Department of Transportation, attributes the increase to the sharp rise in multiple-fatality accidents -- nine in 2003 and only two in 2002. That is a partial explanation but doesn't fully account for the steep increase.

Capt. Jose Gaytan of the Honolulu Police Department's Traffic Division says citations for drunken driving rose by 7 percent in 2003 from the previous year, but police officers are spread thin trying to spot inebriated drivers. "High publicity seems to play the greatest role when it is backed up by credible enforcement," he says.

To that end, police should not wait for Mothers Against Drunk Driving to bring the problem to the public's attention. MADD publicized the statistics last week, using information about Hawaii's fatalities that the police could have made public nearly nine months ago. The belated decision by police departments in Hawaii to maintain one sobriety checkpoint for each week of the year instead of just holidays, beginning in October, should help.

The Lingle administration also should seek federal assistance for the effort. Hawaii was not included among 28 states that received assistance last year by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in the form of sustained enforcement, periodic enforcement crackdowns and paid media advertising funded by Congress. Twelve of those states had decreases that accounted for three-fourths of the nation's total reduction in alcohol-related fatalities last year. Hawaii needs to receive part of that action.

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New screening system
protects passenger data

THE ISSUE A new federal system for screening domestic airline passengers will be tested at airports during the next two months.

AFTER backing away from a plan for detecting possible terrorists at airports, the government has revealed a modified and significantly improved system. The plan is to strictly limit the identifying system to ferret out terrorism suspects without intruding on passengers' personal or financial affairs. Testing during the next two months should provide an indication of its effectiveness and intrusiveness.

David M. Stone, chief of the Transportation Security Administration, says his agency now plans to take over responsibility from the airlines in checking passengers' names against terrorist watch lists. Unlike the initial plan, the system will not screen for wanted criminal suspects or ascribe various threat levels to passengers.

The most objectionable aspect of the initial plan would have used commercial databases that included credit, home ownership and telephone records and car registration in verifying the identification of domestic passengers. Civil libertarians justifiably complained that it would have invaded travelers' privacy.

Under the new system, called "Secure Flight," the government will compare information given to airlines with records from data collection companies that service the banking, home mortgage and credit industries. The information provided by airlines can include credit card numbers, travel reservations, addresses, phone numbers and meal requests, which can indicate a person's religion or ethnicity. The Customs Services already uses such a system for international flights.

Stone says the new system will reduce the number of passengers pulled aside for searches from 15 percent to 5 percent of the nearly 2 million domestic travelers a day. That should be welcome news to businesses concerned about hassles experienced by visitors to Hawaii from the mainland.

It will not help reduce the inconvenience that eastbound tourists will begin experiencing on Sept. 30, when all foreign visitors, even those from visa-waiver countries, will be required to be fingerprinted and photographed upon arrival at Honolulu Airport. Canadians will be the only foreigners exempt from the requirement.

The measures being taken to identify potential terrorists were made necessary by the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. However, as the 9/11 commission pointed out in its recent report, "Our border screening system should check people efficiently and welcome friends. Admitting large numbers of students, scholars, businesspeople and tourists fuels our economy, cultural vitality and political reach."