These words were spoken by Colonel Steven Flaherty, Supt. of the Virginia State Police, in Richmond at the 2nd Annual Virginia Distracted Diving Summit. He was making the point that we would not take out our phones and text or call while competing or participating in sports but we will often do so while driving. In our EndDD.org presentations we have used this 30 second video to make the same point:
The Summit was a great event and Drive Smart Virginia is to be congratulated again for a superb job. Attending the conference has renewed my determination to work harder to save lives. My presentation at the conference was entitled “Friends Don’t Let Friends Drive Distracted” and I described EndDD.org’s newest strategy for teaching teens the skills to speak up when driven by distracted drivers and the confidence to believe that if they do speak up they can change their driver’s behaviors.
I was joined on Wednesday by Captain Steven Chumley, commander of the Richmond Division Office of the Virginia State Police, in doing presentations at two high schools in the Richmond area, Crosby and James River. All told we spoke with nearly 1000 teens. Captain Chumley is also a chaplain and described to the teens what it was like telling parents that their children had been killed in a crash. He was very effective and I hope to work with him and all the folks in Virginia in the future educating the public, teens and adults, about distracted driving.
Joel Feldman
Joel Feldman is the father of the late Casey Feldman and founder of the Casey Feldman Foundation and its sponsored project, EndDD.org. He has been a practicing attorney for 34 years and a shareholder in the law firm of Anapol Weiss in Philadelphia. He received a masters in counseling in 2013 and speaks throughout the U.S. and Canada to teens and adults, changing attitudes and behaviors through the science based, End Distracted Driving program. Joel also provides death notification training to law enforcement and the medical community. Joel can be reached at [email protected]
