The Community Guide in Action

Funding Programs to Prevent Motor Vehicle Occupant Injuries Among Native Americans

CDC’s Injury Center used findings from the Community Guide to develop a Request for Proposal (RFP) targeting Native American communities. Applicants were invited to submit a proposal that addressed any cause of motor vehicle-related injuries, provided it used an intervention that was strongly recommended by the Community Preventive Services Task Force. In this way, CDC’s Injury Center leveraged a relatively small funding budget to achieve its mission of saving lives and reducing the number and severity of injuries. In the fall of 2004, CDC’s Injury Center awarded funds to four Native American tribes to design, implement, and evaluate effective injury prevention programs selected from the Community Guide.

The San Carlos Apache Tribe Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention Program in Arizona used its award to support a full-time program coordinator to work on community-based in Arizona focused on reducing alcohol-impaired driving and increasing seat belt use among their tribal members. Media campaigns, sobriety checkpoints, enhanced police enforcement, and local community events were important components of their program. Since 2004, total DUI arrests increased 52%, driver seat belt use increased 46%, and motor vehicle crashes decreased 29%. In 2007, the San Carlos Tribal Council passed a primary seat belt law and a .08 blood alcohol concentration (BAC) law.

The White Mountain Apache Tribe Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention Program in Arizona focused on increasing seat belt use and decreasing alcohol-impaired driving by conducting DUI sobriety checkpoints, enhanced police enforcement, and a comprehensive media campaign. In 2008 they conducted 24 sobriety checkpoints and stopped 13,408 vehicles. To examine the effects of their program activities, they also tracked rates of seat belt use among drivers and passengers. They found that driver seat belt use increased from 13% to 54% and passenger seat belt use increased from 10% to 32% from 2004 to 2008.

The Tohono O’odham Nation (TON), also in Arizona, passed a primary safety belt law in 2005. To support the new law, the TON Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention Program staff and Securing Tohono O’odham People (STOP) Coalition members focused on increasing seat belt use on the Reservation with a comprehensive media campaign and working with Tribal Police to enforce the new law. To determine the impact of their program activities, they conducted observations of seat belt use among both drivers and passengers. They found that driver seat belt use increased 47% and passenger seat belt use increased 62% from 2005 to 2008.  

The Ho-Chunk Nation Motor Vehicle Prevention Program (MVPP) in Wisconsin set goals to increase seat belt use and child safety seat use. Through a number of activities—including partnering with local County police departments, implementing a comprehensive media campaign, and conducting targeted education and training for police officers—the Program, from 2005 to 2009, has seen driver seat belt use increase 38%, passenger seat belt use increase 94%, and child safety seat use increase from a baseline of 26% in Fall 2005 to 76% in Spring 2009.