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2013 SESSION

13100980D
SENATE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 277
Offered January 9, 2013
Prefiled December 20, 2012
Requesting the Virginia Secretary of Public Safety to coordinate the adoption and implementation of the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management. Report.
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Patron-- Blevins
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Referred to Committee on Rules
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WHEREAS, national statistics show that traffic incidents account for one-quarter of all congestion on U.S. roadways; and

WHEREAS, statistics indicate that for every minute that a freeway travel lane is blocked during a peak travel period, four minutes of travel delay results after the incident is cleared; and

WHEREAS, national statistics show that 15 to 30 percent of the crashes on freeways are secondary to other incidents; and

WHEREAS, the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that struck-by-vehicle incidents accounted for 322 fatalities in 2008, or six percent of all fatal occupational injuries, which includes fire, emergency medical services, law-enforcement, and transportation agency personnel working at the scene of highway incidents; and

WHEREAS, the paramount objective in all highway incident mitigation efforts, protecting the safety of highway travelers and emergency response personnel, requires that fire, emergency medical services, law-enforcement, and transportation agencies work together to achieve multidisciplinary safety and performance goals; and

WHEREAS, nationwide, traffic incident management efforts are credited with reducing annual delay by 129.5 million hours with an associated cost savings of $2.5 billion; and

WHEREAS, safe, quick clearance of highway incidents depends on strong, coordinated multiagency operations; and

WHEREAS, the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management has been developed through the efforts of the National Traffic Incident Management Coalition, a coalition of 24 national transportation, public safety, emergency responder, public safety communications, and private sector associations working together to improve traffic incident management in the United States by linking public safety and transportation communities to define, standardize, and advance the state of traffic incident management practice; and

WHEREAS, the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management has been endorsed by the American Automobile Association, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, the American Traffic Safety Services Association, the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the Cumberland Valley Volunteer Firemen's Association Emergency Responder Safety Institute, the I-95 Corridor Coalition, the International Association of Fire Chiefs, the International Fire Service Training Association, the Institute of Transportation Engineers, the Intelligent Transportation Society of America, the National Association of State EMS Officials, the National Emergency Number Association, and the Towing and Recovery Association of America; and

WHEREAS, the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management consists of three major goals: Responder Safety; Safe, Quick Clearance; and Prompt, Reliable, Interoperable Communications, and includes 18 strategies for achieving those goals; and

WHEREAS, the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management is a voluntary compliance goal intended to improve safety for incident response personnel; encourage safe, quick clearance and prompt, reliable communications; and thereby facilitate clearing incidents as quickly and safely as possible; and

WHEREAS, the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management encourages traffic incident management partnerships and programs, multidisciplinary National Incident Management System and traffic incident management training, goals for performance and progress, utilization of traffic incident management technology, effective traffic incident management policies, and awareness and education partnerships; and

WHEREAS, one action that fire, emergency medical service, law-enforcement, and transportation agencies might prudently and productively undertake to improve coordinated incident response in the Commonwealth of Virginia is to adopt and implement the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management; and

WHEREAS, coordination of multidisciplinary and multijurisdictional resources responding to major emergencies cannot be left to voluntary cooperation alone; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the Senate, the House of Delegates concurring, That the Virginia Secretary of Public Safety be requested to coordinate the adoption and implementation of the National Unified Goal for Traffic Incident Management with representatives of the Department of Emergency Management, the Department of Fire Programs, the Department of State Police, the Department of Transportation, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the Office of Emergency Medical Services, the Virginia Fire Chiefs Association, the Virginia Professional Fire Fighters, the Virginia Association of Volunteer Rescue Squads, the Virginia Association of Governmental EMS Administrators, the Virginia Fire Services Board, the Virginia Sheriff Association, the Virginia State Firefighters Association, the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, and the Virginia Association of Towing and Recovery Operators.

The Virginia Secretary of Public Safety shall submit to the Division of Legislative Automated Systems an executive summary and report of its progress in meeting the requests of this resolution no later than the first day of the 2014 Regular Session of the General Assembly. The executive summary and report shall be submitted for publication as a report document as provided in the procedures of the Division of Legislative Automated Systems for the processing of legislative documents and reports and shall be posted on the General Assembly's website.