Cops get behind the wheel at 911 Driving School

Published 12:50 pm Thursday, June 30, 2011

MARYSVILLE — The best people to train drivers are the people who ticket drivers’ mistakes and clean up their accidents — police officers.

That’s the premise of the 911 Driving School in Marysville, a new franchise business three full-time Arlington police officers own

and operate in their off-duty hours. The school draws customers from Arlington, Lakewood, Marysville, Stanwood, Camano Island, Lake Stevens and Snohomish.

“We strongly believe in this,” said Peter Barrett, a partner in the enterprise. “Looking at data for the number of tickets issued and collision rates for drivers in the first two years after getting their intermediate license, the ones who trained with 911 Driving Schools had the lowest numbers, according to the Washington state Department of Licensing.”

In a national survey of 1,000 teen drivers ages 16 and 17 in 2007, 61 percent reported they had engaged in risky and unsafe driving incidents. Notable teen driving statistics show that 77 percent of teen crashes involved avoidable driver errors, 16-year-olds have more accidents than any other age group, and more than 326,000 young drivers are injured each year.

Further traffic law violation studies published by the 911 Driving School network revealed that 66 percent of teens were driving 10 miles per hour or more over the posted speed limit, 32 percent send text messages while driving, more than 43 percent were reading text messages while driving, and more than eight out of 10 teens who admit to risky driving behavior were talking on cellphones while driving.

On average, out of tens of thousands of students in Washington state, 911 graduates had significantly fewer warning letters, violations, suspensions and collisions than the average for all other driving schools in the state, the company’s data shows.

That’s exactly what Pierce County sheriff’s deputy Andrew Finley hoped would happen when he started the first 911 Driving School in 2000. Today, through franchising, the school has expanded to many communities in Washington and to other states.

Finley recognized that police officers are trained specifically to enforce traffic laws, know the latest law changes and interpretations, have the respect of students, parents and the community, and are able to offer real-life examples of the costly and potentially deadly results of poor driving habits and mindsets.

“The more we learned about this business the more excited we got,” Barrett said. “On duty, we never get this kind of opportunity to talk to people, especially teens, about traffic laws and the stress, expense and worse that can happen from not obeying traffic laws or having careless driving habits. Our business now gives us a chance to talk to them ahead of all of that.”

Although the business serves drivers of all ages and circumstances, Barrett said one of the great motivators for the officers is knowing that they are particularly helping young drivers who are just starting out behind the wheel.

Particularly for new drivers, there’s a heavy emphasis on the fact that laws must be obeyed even if drivers disagree with them or think they know best.

“Drivers learn, for example, that even when you’re sitting at a stop light it’s not all right to talk on their cellphones. It’s still a distraction and still against the law. They’ll get ticketed,” Barrett said.

Johnstone agreed, noting that most accidents are caused by drivers not paying attention to their driving, speed or what’s happening around them.

“Preventing accidents and deaths is really important to me,” he said. “The toughest thing I have to do is knock on someone’s door at 3 a.m. and tell them their son or daughter isn’t coming home.”

911 Driving School has a state-of-the-art classroom, new vehicles that are safe and fun to drive and an excellent curriculum, Barrett said. The area the school “serves” offers a wide variety of driving situations, from residential neighborhoods to freeways, busy intersections and railroad crossings.

The whole program makes sense to the officers for several reasons, including having contact with young drivers when they’re the most teachable, using their thousands of hours of traffic training and experience to reduce accidents on area roads and keeping communities where the officers and their families live safer.

While many officers take on extra jobs to earn money at sports events or off-duty policing at community gatherings, Barrett, Johnstone and Kinney’s business has become their off-duty job.

They admit it can be a stretch to work long hours on their regular shifts and then put in time running 911 Driving School, but they know it will get easier once the business is more established.

Part of their business promotion includes conducting driving safety fairs on weekends or having a booth at the Marysville Strawberry Festival and other events. The school also offers programs for adult drivers, enhancement courses for drivers 55 and older and “reality-check” driving on a closed course for drivers wanting to refine their collision-avoidance skills.

All of the officers have been qualified as driver training instructors in order to run the business.

“We really like working with the teens because we have an opportunity to tell kids that driving is a lot harder than it looks, that things can happen in split seconds and about the dangers of inattention, excessive speed and distractions like cellphones and texting or showing off for friends,” Barrett said.

Johnstone agreed, adding that officers’ families share the roads and he wants their families to be safe, too.

“What makes our driving school different than others is that students hear our stories of the things we respond to every single night and the causes of those accidents. Other driver instructors just see those things on YouTube,” he said.

“We’ve even had other driving schools calling the Arlington Police Department, asking how to interpret state traffic laws so they can teach their students properly,” Johnstone said, adding that police officers are trained extensively to understand and interpret traffic laws so they’re the best people to be training drivers.

In the first six weeks since the 911 Driver School opened in Marysville, the response has been highly positive, Barrett said.

“We’ve had a steady ramping up in business and really an awesome response from the community, comments like ‘I can’t believe no one thought of doing that.’ It’s reassuring to me that people recognize the difference and what we have to offer,” he said.

Learn more

For more information about 911 Driving School, visit the business at 11603 State Ave., Suite D, Marysville, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays or 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays. Check out www.911drivingschool.com, call 360-658-0911 or email Marysville@911drivingschool.com.