Driving is a task that demands your full attention. Even if you’re an outstanding driver, you can’t be sure how your nearby drivers will drive. There’s no telling if they’ll maneuver through traffic in a safe and predictable manner or if they’ll follow all the rules of the road. Because of this, you should make sure you are aware of your surroundings at all times and are prepared to take the necessary evasive action at any given moment.

There are three primary categories distracted driving falls under. These are manual, visual and cognitive distractions. We’ve talked about cognitive distractions already, and in this post, we’ll talk about manual distractions.

Manual distractions are those that cause you to take your hands off the wheel. They could slow your reaction time, causing you to swerve off the road to avoid an accident. No matter what you’re using your hands for, when driving, it’s considered a manual distraction.

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In 2017, the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) entered 651,226 missing person records into their database. This was a .6 percent increase from the 2016 records of 647,435 missing persons. During the same period, the NCIC purged 651,215 records from its database due to the person returned home, law enforcement located the subject or it was determined the record was invalid.

The NCIC is considered the “lifeline” of law enforcement. It’s the electronic crime data clearinghouse that just about any criminal justice agency around the nation can tap into 24 hours a day, all year long. It helps criminal justice professionals locate:

• Identify terrorists
• Apprehend fugitives
• Recover stolen property
• Locate missing persons

It helps law enforcement officers perform their jobs more safely and helps protect the public with necessary information.

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We all know that layered strategies work best for many things in life. Preventing vehicle theft is another one of those things. These steps will help you implement a layered strategy designed to prevent your vehicles from being stolen.

Use Common Sense

Common sense strategies involve multiple steps and can be effective in their own rights. They involve standard safety procedures, like:

• Locking your doors.
• Securing your vehicle.
• Parking in lighted areas or garaging your vehicle at home.
• Hiding valuables inside the vehicle (don’t leave purses on the seat or expensive electronics in visible areas).
• Tinting your windows, which helps to hide valuables inside.
• Never leave your keys in the car.

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Technology is changing the way the world works. This includes the way large and small cities across the country and around the world are addressing their winter weather responses. By creating tools that allow cities to manage winter weather more effectively, technology is helping cities deliver faster responses and more effective management of snow, ice, and traffic. These are some of the tools and technology that are making real differences.

Smart Salt Spreaders

These nifty tools not only help spread salt more efficiently on city, state, and county roads, but also reduce salt consumption by 30 percent. This helps preserve roads, reduce rust, and save money while ensuring adequate coverage for roadways.

GPS Tracking for Snow Plows

GPS tracking not only improves safety for snow plows on the road in dangerous conditions. It also helps plan more efficient and effective routes ensuring that all major thoroughfares get the attention they require without using labor, salt, and/or fuel inefficiently.

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Law enforcement officers have important and dangerous jobs to do. The actions of a few law enforcement officers have placed all under greater scrutiny while strengthening the distrust between law enforcement and ordinary citizens in communities far and wide. Using GPS tracking for law enforcement vehicles, both marked and unmarked can go a long way toward healing the mistrust within the community while improving safety for the men and women who so bravely serve their communities.

Easy Identification/Authentication

While marked cars are easily identifiable, unmarked cars are intentionally difficult to identify as the vehicles of law enforcement officers. People, women drivers, especially, are often hesitant to pull over for vehicles that aren’t easily identifiable as law enforcement vehicles. GPS allows the location of vehicles to be easily tracked so a quick phone call to dispatch can confirm that it is, in fact, a police vehicle that is attempting to pull someone over.

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