Thursday, October 1, 2026
With the Labor Day weekend approaching, Freeport police officials, local elected leaders and representatives from Mothers Against Drunk Driving recently reminded motorists about the dangers of drunk driving, urging them not to drive under the influence of alcohol or illegal substances.
A press conference, which was held in front of Freeport Police Department headquarters on Aug. 19, drew Freeport Mayor Robert Kennedy, Rep. Laura Gillen, Freeport Deputy Police Chief Joseph China, and representatives from MADD, an organization comprised of advocates and people who lost children or other relatives to drunk or drugged driving,
Kennedy, Gillen and others noted that holiday weekends, like the weekend of Labor Day, tend to prompt more parties and social drinking, which in turn increases the likelihood of someone making the poor choice of driving intoxicated.
“Today, and every day, we all have a duty and a responsibility to do our part to end impaired driving, because what we know is that behind every statistic is a human being and a person,” Paige Carbone, MADD's regional executive director, said.
“A mother will never see her child grow and live their life," Carbone, a Melville resident, continued. "A father who will never walk their child down the aisle. A child will grow up without a parent. Survivors must learn how to live with this grief and walk with this grief each and every day. These are our neighbors, our friends, our coworkers and our families.”
After sharing some of the sad testimonies of the families on Long Island and across the nation that have been impacted by drunk driving, Gillen pointed out that it's the responsibility of every driver to make wise decisions before turning on a car engine. But she also stressed that it's the job of the federal government to implement measures to deter drunk or drugged driving. She further detailed how providing such measures has been a bipartisan failure to date.
“All of these losses are heartbreaking, and it’s devastating to know that each and every one of them was preventable,” Gillen said. “In 2021, Congress passed the bipartisan HALT Drunk Driving Act, which directed the Department of Transportation to require drunk driving prevention technology to be incorporated in every new vehicle manufactured in the United States. However, since that law passed, neither the Biden administration [nor] the Trump administration has implemented this law.”
Gillen told the Herald that the technology is designed to detect if a driver is exhibiting behavior consistent with being drunk or drugged. If the system detects this erratic behavior, the car automatically shuts down and prevents the driver from operating the vehicle.
Gillen added that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy has spoken with her to possibly advance the legislation. Gillen and fellow Reps. Mike Lawler, from New York, and Debbie Dingell, from Michigan, also introduced the Drunk Driving Prevention and Enforcement Act, which seeks to implement the HALT act and establish further safety and drug-involved crash data centers. She believes these actions would help further discourage drunk driving and mitigate its damage through law enforcement preventative measures.
“It can be implemented,” Gillen said. “The law says that every new vehicle should implement this technology to save lives, and the Department of Transportation has not sent out that directive yet to auto manufacturers.”
To encourage the technology's further development and implementation, Gillen said that in the Drunk Driving Prevention and Enforcement Act also offers cash incentives for auto companies that can successfully implement this technology and start selling the vehicles commercially.
Mayor Kennedy, who spoke glowingly of Gillen’s efforts, pointed out that the Village of Freeport continues to see high rates of drunk and drugged driving.
“Not only do taxpayers get burdened every year with over 150 DWI arrests between the police officers and our courts, but you have over 40 accidents every year caused by DWI,” Kennedy said. “So, it’s very important that we have to remember to get the word out to get a designated driver, get an Uber, be responsible.”
Deputy Police Chief Joseph China explained how the village dedicates DWI patrols every weekend in the summer to help stop drunk and drugged drivers before they possibly hurt themselves or others with their reckless behavior.
“These patrols have led to the arrests of hundreds of drivers, hundreds of dangerous drivers taken off our road,” China said.
He also asserted that while Freeport takes up only 1 percent of Nassau County geographically, the Freeport Police Department accounted for 16.4 percent of all DWI arrests countywide last year. While this statistic underscores the enforcement efforts of Freeport police, the high rate of drunk drivers being caught operating vehicles on Freeport roads provides reason for added vigilance and concern.
Eric Jones, a representative from Gillen’s office, told the Herald that the high volume of traffic on Sunrise Highway, which cuts through the middle of Freeport, and its proximity to marine recreational activities on Freeport’s southern coast may contribute to the relatively large number of reported DWIs.
Gillen added that police and elected officials are also urging boat owners to avoid operating their vessels while impaired with alcohol or illegal substances.
According to a study by the Valley Spring Recovery Center, a New Jersey based agency, on data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the state of New York collectively had 12 percent of its deadly car crashes involving a drunk driver from 2019 to 2023. This rate is the third-lowest of all U.S. states and below the national average of 17.5 percent. However, due to New York’s relatively high population, the total number of crashes and drunk driving crashes is still more than many states.
