Courtesy Picture / El Camino
Collaborating companies embody El Camino and Besame meals truck parks, Dive Bar and Restaurant and Dakota East Facet Icehouse.
San Antonio and Texas have a drinking-and-driving drawback.
Over the previous two years, the variety of alcohol-related highway accidents in Texas is down barely, however the variety of fatalities attributed to intoxication whereas working a car has gone up, in accordance with latest Texas Division of Transportation (TxDOT) statistics.
In the meantime, Bexar County ranks third-highest within the state in its variety of DUI/DWI crashes, in accordance with TxDOT’s numbers. In 2022, Texas witnessed a 2% rise in drunk driving-related fatalities, with a staggering 1,162 lives misplaced. That interprets to about three deaths a day.
Much more tragic: not a day has passed by since November 7, 2000, that the Lone Star State did not file a highway fatality.
San Antonio’s newly shaped Free Rides Undertaking is working to place a dent in these numbers by encouraging companies that serve alcohol to supply free journey share providers to patrons who want them.
Every partnering bar or restaurant shows a big inexperienced sticker noting its participation within the Undertaking. All a patron must do is ask for a supervisor who’s approved to get them organized a Lyft or Uber.
Presently, collaborating companies — which embody El Camino and Besame meals truck parks, Dive Bar and Restaurant and Dakota East Facet Icehouse — pay for the rides out of pocket. Nevertheless, the Free Rides Undertaking is within the means of making use of for nonprofit standing, which can permit it to lift funds to defray or utterly cowl these prices.
“In fact we would like to have the ability to fund the Free Rides for the bars by means of the group, as a result of so many of those bars are already struggling to maintain their doorways open,” Free Rides Program Government Director Azeza Salama stated. “A number of [business owners] cannot afford to maintain such a dedication, however these are bars which are actively investing in defending their group, so we’re working diligently with town, state and county to get this initiative off the bottom.”
Survivor-Sufferer
Salama, a bubbly San Antonio native, has good cause for her severe funding within the coalition’s trigger. She herself is a victim-survivor of a drunk driving accident.
On a balmy night simply over eight years in the past, she, her kids and fiancé, Johnny Hernandez, took a drive to select up tacos for his or her night meal. On the way in which residence, an allegedly intoxicated motorist struck Salama’s car head-on.
Hernandez died on impression, as did the driving force of the opposite car.
On the time, Salama labored within the insurance coverage business, the place she’d created a powerful group community of movers and shakers. The life-altering crash prompted her to depart the career and go to work for Moms Towards Drunk Driving.
“Drunk drivers actually do not discriminate once they’re behind the wheel. Race, faith, it actually would not matter,” Salima stated. “Since then, it is develop into essential to me to be out locally and speaking about this.”
Relaunched effort
Salama’s background in fundraising and venture administration labored in her favor when she made the transfer to MADD, after which to Free Rides, which launched in 2019, simply earlier than the COVID-19 pandemic reached U.S. shores.
On the preliminary launch, co-founders Albert Cortez — proprietor of Excellent 10 gentleman’s membership — and Henry Avelar had a number of bars signed as much as take part in this system, however many did not survive the pandemic.
Undaunted, Salama relaunched this system in 2023 with a newfound verve.
“We need to carry systematic change to the group by having these tough conversations, and altering the way in which individuals have a look at these companies,” she stated. “I at all times inform events, ‘You are not only a bar proprietor, my good friend. You are a enterprise proprietor.'”
As soon as Free Rides reaches its nonprofit standing, Salama plans to use for federal grants to assist cowl the price of rides. That can permit this system to supply stipends or reimbursements to collaborating companies, lightening the monetary burden for each patrons and bar house owners.
The price of a journey share service is not the one deterrent partygoers face once they’re out in town, nonetheless. Some fear that in the event that they hail a Lyft or Uber, they will return to the subsequent day to search out out their very own car has been towed, Salama stated.
To that finish, she and the group’s founders are encouraging native policymakers to create a metropolis ordinance that will forestall towing corporations from eradicating autos left by Free Rides customers.
“We’re actually making an attempt to mitigate every issue which may deter somebody from asking the bar to get them organized a journey residence,” Salama stated. “I at all times say we’re making an attempt to be proactive, not reactive. There is usually a stigma surrounding asking for assist getting residence, and that is in all probability the hardest a part of this grassroots initiative. However we have now to have these tough, taboo conversations, as a result of they’ll actually save lives.”
Subscribe to SA Present newsletters.
Comply with us: Apple Information | Google Information | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Fb | Twitter| Or join our RSS Feed
