Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Brandon and area chapter, are part of a movement to prevent needless tragedies that rob families of their loved ones. MADD volunteers, with approval and help of cities and towns, are placing signage such as that recently posted on Virden’s east Frontage Road, and other entrances into Virden, advising the public to call 911 if they witness drunk driving.
Vicki Renwick, a MADD volunteer was impacted fi rsthand by the loss of her daughter.
“My daughter Taylor was killed by a drunk driver,” says Vicki Renwick, a MADD representative.
Renwick, from Napinka, Manitoba spoke of the devastating results. “For our family, it affected our whole community because Melita and Napinka are small towns. Until it happens that close to home, you don’t think about it,” she says.
Taylor, 20 was on the drive home to Napinka on Thanksgiving weekend, Friday evening, Oct. 13, 2015. A drunk driver collided head-on with Renwick’s vehicle on Hwy 2 near St. Claude, killing Taylor who was alone in the vehicle.
“So that’s what got our whole family started with MADD. Danielle Lewis, Vicki Renwick’s oldest daughter is president. Her youngest daughter is victims’ services coordinator and her father also holds a position within Brandon’s MADD organization.
“We are based out of Brandon, but we are really trying to get out further. We want more volunteers because the more we can get from these communities the better.” Renwick points out that impaired driving affects rural areas and small communities too. “It’s not just a city problem.”
Signs are up in many places. “In Brandon… probably a year we’ve been doing them and now we are finally getting them out to some rural areas. So we’re excited that Virden was ok to go ahead with it.”
As well as the call-in signage, ‘Impaired driver caught here’ is another sign that MADD is using, hoping that putting a location to the issue will help drivers think soberly about the responsibilities of driving.
There are some up in Brandon. She said, “In Brandon, by the sportsplex, there’s a school. I drove by there the other day and there’s a sign there. Someone was caught, impaired, by that school. That’s really disturbing to me. People think that it happens on the highway… at night. But it happens in broad daylight, in the city. And it does in small towns too.”
She’s not anti-alcohol, but says people need to arrange for a sober driver. She says the signs can help people know what to do if they see a drunk driver.
“Hopefully someone will see the sign and just choose not to do it. If we can stop one family from going through what we went through and continue to go through, then it’s worth the time and effort.” The signage clearly indicates if a driver is suspected of impairment, witnesses should call 911.
Sgt. Scott Fefchak of Westman RCMP says, “These calls are important because obviously, we can’t be everywhere all the time. Many times, what is reported as an impaired driver is found to be inattention, distracted, or sometimes just a plain old bad driver. Sometimes they are indeed found to be impaired by drug or alcohol….”
If people call in a suspected impaired driver, they may be needed to provide a statement and testify in court as to what they saw.
“Unless we have clear details (license plate # or the ID of the suspect and/ or location) there’s a good chance we may be unsuccessful locating the vehicle given our huge areas of responsibility. If we don’t witness something firsthand, we rely on witnesses to provide evidence of someone breaking the law. Those are the rules of the road, and it’s not what we know it’s what we can prove,” says Fefchak.
