WASHINGTON - The mission of the National Commission Against Drunk Driving is to continue the efforts of the Presidential Commission On Drunken Driving to reduce impaired driving and its tragic consequences by uniting a broad-based coalition of public and private sector organizations and other concerned individuals who share this common purpose.

So, how are we, the traffic safety community, and the nation doing? During the 1980s and early 1990s, pretty well - considering a nearly a 40 percent drop in alcohol- related highway deaths. Lately, however, not well at all - alcohol-related deaths have stagnated at 16,000 per year, with a 4 percent increase last year.

What is needed to re-engage the fight against drunken driving to reduce these numbers and the horrific personal tragedies that they represent? The NCADD and most traffic safety professionals agree that we need to get back to basics. By that we mean focusing on where drunken driving occurs - in our local communities - and giving our local police, the courts, probation, treatment and driver licensing agencies the political permission/support and resources to do their jobs.

Homeland security starts in our hometowns. We know how to reduce drunken driving, but we are not using the tools, knowledge and resources we already have. The basic "drunken driver control system" (from arrest to treatment) is broken or dysfunctional at the local level.

Most communities need more resources, and some states more effective legislation. In most states, DWI arrests are down, while processing a single arrest can take up to four hours and 16 different forms; DWI trials occur as distant as one year after the arrest; convicted offenders get minimal sanctions; and most suspended drivers continue to drive without valid licenses.

The hard-core drunken drivers know how to play the game even when caught, and they continue driving drunk, frequently and with reckless abandon.

Highway safety professionals and experts know that there are three attributes every state and local drunken driving control system must have to be effective: drunken drivers must expect to be detected and arrested; they must receive a substantial penalty, reliably and without exception; and that penalty must be applied soon after the arrest.

Creating this deterrent environment is key because we simply do not have enough police to catch the majority of drunken drivers.

Interest in fighting drunken driving has ebbed and flowed among the public and public officials over the years. At the local level, police are constantly pushed and pulled to the crisis of the month. However, passage of the federal TEA-21 highway bill by Congress in 1998 offered a boost to state highway safety programs with the promise of extra funding. Some new and renewed programs were implemented. And then came September 11, 2001.

Some highway safety advocates fear that our current focus on homeland security spells doom to any renewed attention to drunken driving, occupant protection and other critical issues.

To the contrary. We believe that homeland security and highway safety are not mutually exclusive. In fact, increased traffic law enforcement is one of the best ways to suppress crime in a community.

Successful programs like North Carolina's "Click It or Ticket" have shown that regular and well-publicized safety belt and drunken driving checkpoints can generate large numbers of felony arrests. Recall that Timothy McVey was caught as a result of a traffic stop. Criminals and terrorists often drive to their "work", and are not very respectful of traffic laws. Increasing traffic law enforcement can increase our security AND reduce drunken driving.

With nearly 16,000 Americans dying and hundreds of thousands injured each year in alcohol-related traffic crashes, we cannot afford to ignore this ever-present threat to our safety and security. Most of us can do little, personally, to fight the external threats posed by foreign extremists. But we can and we must fight to stop the needless, preventable casualties caused by drunken driving.