Spring in Minnesota means warmer weather ahead and the return of roadside work zones, more miles logged with vacations and other travel, and motorcycles back on the road.

This is an important time to educate drivers on how they can keep themselves and others safe while on the road. In April, we’ll mark National Distracted Driving Awareness Month led by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, support the annual Minnesota’s motorcycle Flood Run on Saturday, April 15 with its emphasis on safety, and April 17-21 we’ll put the spotlight on National Work Zone Awareness Week.

Employers, safety leaders and others committed to driver safety play vital roles in making this important education happen. You get this critical life-saving information and the meaningful stories directly to your teams in caring and credible ways. We appreciate your efforts.

To help you maximize the importance of these three key traffic safety education events, check out the websites for each of the campaigns to find numerous tools available to you. In addition, our own Minnesota NETS DriveSafeMN site features fact sheets, safety talks, videos and other turn-key tools on these topics to help you get the job done. Here are just a few examples:

I’ll leave you with this sobering statistic. Each year more than 3,000 Americans are killed in distracted driving crashes. The economic toll of all motor vehicle crashes in the U.S. annually exceeds $400 billion. Let’s work together to change that!