SYRACUSE, NY, JANUARY 13, 2010 - AAA Western and Central New York recognized the Village of Baldwinsville, Town of Camillus, Town of DeWitt, Village of East Syracuse, Village of Liverpool, and their respective police departments for their success in AAA’s Community Traffic Safety Program at the Onondaga County Traffic Safety Advisory Board’s Annual Recognition Ceremony, held at Justin’s Grill in East Syracuse on January 12th.

AAA’s Community Traffic Safety Program is an awards and recognition program for communities of all sizes nationwide that identify and address their local traffic safety issues. The program considers basic crash statistics, presence of a traffic safety leadership group, projects, and their effectiveness. The awards progress from Honorable Mention to Bronze, Silver, Gold, and to the highest level, Platinum.

Top Platinum honors were awarded to Baldwinsville, Camillus, and East Syracuse. Gold Awards were presented to DeWitt and Liverpool.

Gold Awards are given to communities that implement programs and projects that demonstrate superior effort at addressing local traffic safety issues. Platinum Awards are given to communities that not only demonstrate outstanding success in addressing local traffic safety issues, but show a clear trend of improvement over five years and/or provide data that is substantially better than the statewide data for communities of similar size.

“These communities have shown incredible leadership in developing workable solutions that have saved lives and property,” said Wally Smith, Vice President of AAA Western and Central New York. “We are delighted to give recognition to these great efforts that have advanced the cause of traffic safety.”

Baldwinsville is receiving their third Platinum Award, demonstrating success in addressing bicycle and pedestrian safety, occupant protection, speeding, aggressive and impaired driving. Additionally, Baldwinsville met the criteria for a Platinum Award with their statistics for vehicle occupant injuries and seat belt usage. Baldwinsville has participated in the program ten years, and in total, is the recipient of two Silver, five Gold, and three Platinum Awards.

Camillus is receiving their third consecutive Platinum Award, demonstrating success in addressing aggressive and distracted driving including cell phone usage, impaired driving and underage drinking, occupant protection, speeding, extreme motorcycling, bicycle, pedestrian, school bus, school zone, and teen driver safety. Additionally, Camillus met the criteria for a Platinum Award with their statistics for seat belt usage and DWI crashes. Camillus has participated in the program for nine years, and in total, is the recipient of one Silver, five Gold and three Platinum Awards.

East Syracuse is receiving their second Platinum Award, demonstrating success with programs addressing aggressive and impaired driving, occupant protection, child passenger safety, speeding and school zone safety. East Syracuse met the criteria for a Platinum Award with their statistics for vehicle occupant injuries and seat belt usage. East Syracuse has participated in the program for four years, and in total, is the recipient of two Gold and two Platinum Awards.

DeWitt is receiving their second Gold Award in two years of participation, demonstrating success in addressing impaired and aggressive driving, speeding, occupant protection, novice driver, school bus and school zone safety.

Liverpool is receiving their eighth Gold Award in eight years of participation, demonstrating success with programs addressing pedestrian and school bus safety, occupant protection, extreme motorcycling, aggressive, impaired, and distracted driving including cell phone usage.

In neighboring Oswego County, a Platinum Award will be presented to the City of Fulton. Only ten communities in New York State received Platinum honors. In addition to Baldwinsville, Camillus, East Syracuse, and Fulton, Platinum Awards were presented to the communities of Brockport, Garden City, New Rochelle, Port Washington, Tarrytown, and White Plains, NY.

Participation in AAA’s Community Traffic Safety Program is open to communities of all sizes nationwide.

As Upstate New York’s largest member services organization, AAA provides over 880,000 members with travel, insurance, financial and automotive related services. Since its founding in 1900, AAA has been a leading advocate for the safety and security of all travelers. Visit AAA at www.AAA.com.