To show my continued support for the community, road safety and alcohol awareness, I will participate in the annual Walk Like Madd event benefiting MADD, Mother’s Against Drunk Drivers. The 5K fun walk is this Saturday, September 17, 2011. Registration begins at 8:30 a.m. with opening ceremonies at 9:30 a.m. We’ll meet at the State Farm Atlanta Operations Center in Duluth.
There are lots of fun activities planned for all including a Salsa demonstration, a bouncy castle and a dunk tank for cooling off.
The Mayor of Johns Creek, Mike Bodker is scheduled to attend.
“It is an honor for our city to be chosen as a site for the annual Walk Like MADD event. We all owe a debt of gratitude to the Georgia affiliate of Mothers Against Drunk Driving for raising awareness of the preventable nature and tragedy of drunk driving. We appreciate their offering this great event to our community and look forward to its success,” said Mayor Bodker.
Also in attendance will be the newly elected National President of MADD, Jan Withers will be at the walk. Withers joined forces with MADD in 1992 after her 15-year-old daughter Alisa was killed in an underage drinking crash.
MADD is the nation’s largest nonprofit working to protect families from drunk driving and underage drinking.
The following are a few statistics relating to driving under the influence of alcohol, according to MADD’s web site:
In 2010, 10,839 people died in drunk-driving crashes, one every 50 minutes.
Every minute one person is injured from an alcohol-related crash.
One in three people will be involved in an alcohol-related crash in their lifetime.
MADD serves a victim or survivor of drunk driving every 9 minutes.
Teen alcohol use kills about 6000 people each year, more than all illegal drugs combined.
Car crashes are the leading cause of death for teens and one out of three of those is alcohol related.