Civil Leadership
Citizen Enforcement Can Eliminate Vehicle Idling: Turn Your Engine Off When Stopped!
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Samara Swanston, George Pakenham
New York City has two laws intended to limit the idling of motor vehicles-- no person is permitted to cause the engine of a vehicle to idle for longer than three minutes and no person is permitted to cause the engine of a motor vehicle to idle for longer than one minute if such vehicle is adjacent to a public school or non-public school unless it is loading. Although these idling restrictions have been in place in the City for a number of years, many drivers persist in idling, leading to questions about the effectiveness of these laws. Citizen enforcement could require the city to set up a page on their website where individuals could submit video to the Department showing violations of the City’s anti-idling law. For those videos that lead to a civil penalty for the violator, the individual who submitted the video would be entitled to 50% of the civil penalty amount. It would also raise the fine amounts for a first violation of the City’s anti-idling law by approximately 50%. Finally, it would require DEP to hold training sessions on the requirements for submission of successful complaint regarding the violation of the City’s anti-idling law.
Understanding the Culture of Traffic Safety Citizenship
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Jay Otto, Kari Finley, Nicholas Ward
Risky driving behaviors such as drinking and driving, speeding, and not wearing a seat belt are major contributing factors to roadway fatalities. To reach zero deaths, we must affect change using novel approaches. One such approach is to empower the majority of safe road users to engage in prosocial behaviors to impact the smaller group engaging in risky behaviors The goal is to instill a sense of responsibility in everyone for the safety of others. An integrated behavioral model guided the development of a survey to understand values, beliefs, and attitudes regarding engagement in prosocial behaviors that impact the traffic safety of others. Results of the study provide a better understanding of traffic safety citizenship behavior thus informing how to grow these conditions in communities. Using data from a random sample of adults in the United States, this paper will identify values, attitudes, and behaviors predictive of traffic safety behaviors and their relationship to two measures of traffic safety citizenship behaviors: asking someone to wear a seat belt and asking someone to stop reading or typing on a cell phone while driving. Recommendations to increase traffic safety citizenship will be discussed.
Knowledge of In-school Youth Regarding Responsible Citizenship in Vhembe District, South Africa: Responsible Citizenship
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Makondelele Makatu
The study explored the knowledge that in-school youth in Vhembe District, South Africa have regarding responsible citizenship. Qualitative and exploratory design was adopted to access in-depth data. Mobilization processes were considered to access twenty male and female youth in a particular rural community that was purposefully selected. In order to collect data, semi-structured face-to-face interviews were conducted with each participant. Data were analysed thematically. It was evident in the analysed data that in-school youth define responsible citizenship in terms of knowledge and practice of one’s constitutional rights, lifestyle, and relationship and interaction with peers, siblings, and parents. It was concluded that in-school youth have a clear knowledge regarding responsible citizenship and understand that being responsible should be compared with being irresponsible so that in-school youth know how to live in their communities and at school. The study recommended that in-school youth must be trained on issues about responsible citizenship so that they can be part of development of their families, communities, and schools.
