TRAFFIC DEATHS ON RISE FAILURE TO WEAR SEAT BELTS SEEN AS CAUSE OF SPIKE IN ROAD FATALITIES.

Byline: Amy Raisin Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - Officers at the California Highway Patrol's Newhall station are stepping up efforts to cite drivers and passengers who aren't wearing seat belts.

Locally and statewide, the CHP's ``mileage death rate'' has jumped, and CHP Lt. Mark Odle of the Newhall station is not pleased. The mileage death rate is the average of fatal crashes per 100 million miles driven.

``There's an absolute correlation between seat-belt compliance and the MDR,'' he said Friday, just days after his station launched special patrols for seat-belt violators. ``It's all right there in the numbers. During the years when seat belt compliance is lower, (crash-related) deaths go up.''

California saw record-low mileage death rates in 1998 and 1999, with 1.19 deaths per 100 million miles of vehicle travel. But that number inched up to 1.22 in 2000 and now stands at an estimated 1.26, said CHP Officer Wendy Moore.

Odle said his officers began special seat-belt patrols Wednesday, with an eye toward saving lives.

``We're more proactive with enforcing seat-belt compliance,'' Odle said. ``We take the same resources and step up this particular issue we need to address. I've seen so many deaths where it was painfully and sadly apparent that people weren't wearing their seat belts.''

According to the data released by the CHP, 3,730 people were killed in 3,331 fatal collisions in California in 2000. More lives were lost on Los Angeles County roads that year than any other county in the state, as 749 people were killed in 694 crashes.

Odle said the Newhall station has recorded a 40 percent increase in traffic crashes on the Golden State Freeway between Lyons Avenue and SR 126 in the first half of 2003, compared with the same period last year.

``In part, it's because there's been such a high volume of construction,'' Odle said. ``In the last 10 months, I've noticed that the number of fatality crashes is about the same as before, but there's been a climb in the number of deaths per crash.''

The failure to wear a seat belt is a key cause, authorities said.

In Newhall's area alone, Moore counted 20 deadly crashes since 1998 that each claimed the life of more than one person.

But she cautions that those numbers pertain only to CHP-patrolled roads. The high-speed crash that killed four people on Sand Canyon Road in 2000 - including two teenage brothers - fell under the jurisdiction of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

Amy Raisin, [phone]

amy.raisin(at)dailynews.com