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Officer's drive earns notice The Tulsa police captain is honored for his work to improve driver training.Tulsa Police Capt. Travis Yates doesn't want to talk too much about himself, but his work on the department's driver training program has earned him national recognition. Yates, who says he's passionate about driver training, was recently honored as an honorary fellow in a safety organization, Advanced Drivers of America. "I have been watching Capt. Travis Yates' work from a distance for the past two years, and there is no doubt that he is at the forefront of police driving standards in the U.S.A.," Eddie Wren, the organization's policy director, said in a statement. |
The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund reports that 153 officers died last year in automobile crashes across the country -- 48 percent of all police officer deaths that year. The fund's Web site says that the number of police officers killed in crashes has increased 40 percent in the last 30 years.
Yates said the award has more to do with the officers he works with than with himself.
"This isn't just about me," he said. "I just happen to be someone who has always spoken out about it."
Driver training became Yates' passion when he went through the police academy's program. After he graduated, he saw officer-involved crashes that could have been avoided with more training.
"It's not just an accident," he said. "We have to get that out of our heads. There are things that officers can do to avoid tragedy."
Yates became a driver training officer about eight years ago. He's since become a kind of 21st-century driver training advocate, writing for Web sites and giving interviews to media outlets across the country.
Through his Web site, www.policedriving.com, Yates has helped push driver training to the forefront of an awareness movement encouraging departments across the country to develop progressive training programs.
He is also working on a proposal that would make Tulsa officers take driver training each year.
The Tulsa Police Department provides everything from mental health services to annual firearms training for its officers, Yates said, but "we're ignoring issues that are literally killing officers."
Although the department requires more driver training than the state minimum, it lags the departments in Broken Arrow and Sand Springs, which already train their personnel every year.
After the death of Sapulpa Police Officer Larry Cantrell on July 30, Sapulpa police called Yates about establishing annual driver training there, Yates said.
Cantrell, 34, had been less than an hour into his shift when he swerved his police cruiser to avoid another vehicle, causing the police car to flip. His father, Charles Cantrell, 59, was riding with him. Both men died in the crash, which happened while Officer Cantrell was headed to help an officer who was chasing someone on foot.
Yates hopes to put some heat on state officials to upgrade Oklahoma's law enforcement driver training requirement, set by the Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training. It requires only three days of driver training once after officers graduate from their academies.
"I challenge the state of Oklahoma to step forward and make this mandatory," he said. "That's really where the whole problem lies. They have chosen not to do that."
As a sergeant, Yates devised a mandatory department-wide class in 2001 that reduced the department's at-fault accident rate by 18 percent. The numbers have stuck since then, he said.
"All it takes is a large parking lot and some cones," he said of the training.
Matt Elliott 581-8366
matt.elliott@tulsaworld.com
