MoDOT to Increase Seat Belt Checks until June 3

The Missouri Department of Transportation will spend the next two weeks to increase seat belt use in the state. 

Missouri's seat belt use is consistently below the national average of 85 percent, MoDOT said in a news release. Missouri's teens and pick-up truck drivers are among those least likely to buckle up at 66 and 61 percent. Seat belt use in the state remains around 76 percent.

More than 200 of the state's law enforcement agencies will participated in Click It or Ticket, a national campaign. During last year's event, Missouri law enforcement officers wrote more than 5,500 seat belt tickets.

Officers will take a zero tolerance approach towards people who do not use seat belts or place children in proper seat belt systems, said Colonel Ronald K. Replogle, superintendent of the Highway Patrol. 

"The best thing motorists can do to protect themselves while traveling in a motor vehicle is to buckle their seat belts and to make sure everyone else in the vehicle is buckled as well," Replogle said.

Leanna Depue, chair of the executive committee of the Missouri Coalition for Roadway Safety, said law enforcement will use portable boards to post messages about fatalities and seat belt citations; partner with high schools and large employers to get them to adopt seat belt policies; and offer incentives to positively reinforce wearing a seat belt.