Click It or Ticket event held at Battleship

If you’re hitting the roads this holiday weekend, make sure you buckle up.

Law enforcement officers from across the state came together at the battleship Wednesday to launch the fifteenth year of the state’s Click It or Ticket campaign.

In North Carolina, 39 percent of those killed in car accidents were not wearing their seat belts.

Wilmington Police Chief Ralph Evangelous said early education is the best way to save lives.

“When I go into schools and talk to kids, I ask, ‘How many of your parents don’t wear seatbelts?’ And always three or four kids raise their hands. So I give them homework. I want them to tell them to wear their seatbelts.”

The Click It or Ticket program began here in North Carolina back in 1993.

Now all states participate in the program, which has helped raise the seat belt use rate from 68 percent to 82 percent since 1996.