In a press conference today held at the State House in Providence, Rhode island, Joel Feldman and Dianne Anderson joined trial lawyers and elected officials to announce an initiative that will result in every teen in Rhode Island seeing the EndDD.org/60forSafety distracted driving presentation. Rhode Island Association for Justice(RIAJ) president, Anthony Leone has made reaching out to the community to promote safety a central part of his presidency. Trial lawyers across Rhode Island have committed to going into every high school to educate teens about distracted driving to save young lives.
Anthony Leone was joined by Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chaffee, Speaker of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, Gordon Fox; Senate Judiciary Chair, Michael McCaffery, Joel Feldman and Dianne Anderson. There was incredible support for the program. Joel Feldman spoke about how he was inspired to create the program following Casey’s death caused by a distracted driver in 2009 . Joel described the scientific nature of the presentation and the very successful pilot program in the spring of 2012 which resulted in more than 41,000 teens seeing the presentation. Joel said “all of Casey’s friends have changed the way they drive as a result of Casey’s death. I have changed the way I drive as a result of Casey’s death-we created this program so that it would not take personal tragedies for all of us to change the way we drive.”
Rhode Island is the first of a number of states’ Trial lawyer organizations to have their trial lawyers go into schools and talk with students about distracted driving. Kentucky, Indiana, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania have announced similar plans and more states are signing on. It is estimated that the program will reach more than 275,000 teens this year.
To find out about the program, participate as a speaker or arrange a presentation, send an e-mail to [email protected].
To watch TV coverage of the press conference go to https://www.enddd.org/news-feature/foundation-aims-to-keep-drivers-focused/.
