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Letter of Concern
Raven Green
Indiana Wesleyan University
Advocacy in Human Services
HMSR-340-01A
Professor Benedetto Mongiovi
July 22, 2015

The Honorable Marco Rubio

284 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington D.C. 20510

Dear Senator Rubio,

My name is Raven Green. I am a 35 year old single mother of 3 children. We live in North Port
Florida. I am writing you because I am seriously concerned with the number of fatalities and injuries in our
state that are caused by impaired drivers. I feel this issue directly impacts my family because not only do I
drive these roads with my children in the car, I have 2 teenagers that will be driving within a year or so. I
am employed full time for Charlotte County. I see a staggering amount of arrests for driving under the
influence on an everyday basis, a lot of them with property damage, injuries and death. I would like to
address some facts about this issue and offer my opinion on a couple ideas to combat this problem.

I will begin with statistics from the last 5 years in our state. In 2010 there were 678 fatalities, in
2011 there were 716 fatalities, in 2012 there were 709 fatalities, in 2013 there were 790 and there were
676 fatalities in 2014. That is 3,569 lives that were taken because someone didnt have the common sense
not to drive. This is approximately 2 residents of our state every single day, this has to stop. I believe we
took a small step in the right direction in 2014 by expanding our ignition interlock device requirements.
Prior to expanding the law the ignition interlock was only ordered if the driver had a BAC of .15 or above.
Now that the law includes an option for all drivers no matter what their BAC level is I feel that we should
implement a couple other things to complement our existing law.

I am asking you, Senator Rubio, to take a look at our state and ask yourself why Florida is always
in the top 5 states that have the most alcohol related fatalities.

The first thing I would like to see is more effort out of our justice system in dealing with people
that are thought to be driving under the influence. Right now all we do is an automatic suspension of a persons
license if they refuse a breath test. I would like to see our officers have the ability to obtain a warrant right
away to test a persons BAC level, breath or blood. The second thing I would like to see is more sobriety
checkpoints more often. So far this year in my area there have only been 2, New Years and Memorial Day
weekend. I think they should be set up monthly, at different locations and most importantly, without anyone
knowing where they are going to be. When the news, social media and the newspaper advertise these it defeats
their purpose. In closing, I would like for you to inquire more about the Driver Alcohol Detection System for
Safety when it becomes available. Thank you for the time it took to listen to my concerns.

Sincerely,
Raven Green
1101 Ohana Way
North Port, FL 34289
317-938-7330