Delaware’s Office of Highway Safety will conduct its Sober Rides initiative on two different nights for those celebrating St. Patrick’s Day.
The Sober Rides program provides $20 ride-share vouchers to help prevent impaired driving and provide those out drinking a safe ride home.
"Delaware has seen strong participation in previous Sober Rides activations. We actually had 244 people utilize the safe ride home on New Year's Eve. So we're hoping for that same outcome for these 2 days, noticing that people really are using those vouchers throughout the state," said Delaware Office of Highway Safety community relations officer Kayla Mason.
With St. Patrick’s Day on a Tuesday and many establishments running weekend specials to celebrate, OHS is offering the program on two different days this year.
Round 1 will be Saturday March 14 from noon until 3 am on Sunday March 15 Round 2 is Tuesday March 17 – St. Patrick’s Day – from noon until 3 am on Wednesday March 18.
The voucher codes will be released at mysoberrides.com each day at 10 am, noon and 3 pm, and are available on a first-come, first-served basis while supplies last.
Mason says the strategy to release the codes allows for more usage.
"We definitely made that decision because we've had cases where we've had quite a few rides claimed, but they've not necessarily been taken,” said Mason. “So we've started to release them at different times so it gives more people an opportunity to grab them and use them versus people grabbing them first thing in the morning, and then maybe they forget or they decide that they don't need it just so that we are making sure we're hitting everyone, no matter what time of the day it was."
OHS in partnership with Delaware State Police and local law enforcement agencies will also conduct a DUI checkpoint Friday night in Sussex County as another way to help prevent impaired driving this weekend.
