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Why was the Sing for Safety Foundation started?
In the Spring of 2000, my family and I were vacationing in California. We were rear-ended by a drunk driver and pushed into the car in front of us. I watched my father taken away in an ambulance and the man who hit us was handcuffed and taken away by police. His blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit. My father had internal bleeding and injured his shoulder, wrist and knees. He has had many surgeries as a result of the accident. I have since watched my very athletic father's body deteriorate over time, causing him a great deal of pain. It has changed my family forever. As a new driver, it is hard for me to look in my rear view mirror and wonder if the headlights will stop at an appropriate distance behind me, or hit me, the way the drunk driver hit my family that night.
During the spring of 2006, just after midnight, my mother heard a sound she will never forget. There was a horrible grinding of metal and then deafening thuds. She looked out our kitchen window and saw an SUV upside-down in front of our house. Frantically, she called 911 and then my family ran outside. Two 16 year old boys had just left a party at a house on my street. The driver lost control of his car and according to the police, the vehicle flipped three times. The passenger, Samir Talwar, who was not wearing a seatbelt, was ejected from the car and died. It was a tragic accident and its devastating effects were far reaching. Many kids were in shock and routinely came to the crash site to mourn their friend's death.
One of those mourners, Charlie Glik, was a boy I had known all of my life. Our fathers also grew up together. Charlie was deeply affected by the accident at my house and started a campaign called "Click for Glik", to encourage teens to remember to buckle up. Late one night this past summer, he was on his way home when he crashed into a telephone pole and died. He was not wearing a seatbelt, although due to the severity of the impact, it was said that a seatbelt might not have saved his life.
Because of these accidents and the untimely deaths of boys my own age, I felt I could no longer sit back and do nothing. I read many articles and reviewed statistics on teen driving accidents. I learned that car crashes caused by teen drivers are the number one killer of teens.
The result is the formation of the Sing for Safety Foundation. The Foundation is very fortunate to have highly concerned, committed and knowledgeable people who have volunteered to join the Board of Directors and the Advisory Board. We are in the process of building a Teen Executive Council and a Teen Concert Committee, comprised of 14-19 year olds, that is diverse and representative of the teen population in the area, to work on upcoming safety projects and spread the word to fellow teens.
-Melissa Gall
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