Uniform Guidelines for State Highway Safety Programs

Judicial and Court Services

Highway Safety Program Guideline No. 7

Each State, in cooperation with political subdivisions and Tribal governments, should develop and implement a comprehensive, highway safety program, reflective of State traffic safety needs, as identified by the data, to achieve a significant reduction in traffic crashes, fatalities, and injuries on public roads. Each State should have a comprehensive judicial services program as part of its overall highway safety program. Such judicial services programs should support courts in the competent and effective adjudication of both administrative and statutory law cases. Judicial services programs should, consistent with ethical and professional requirements, promote judicial outreach activity to reduce traffic crashes and resultant fatalities and injuries. This document describes the four key components of State judicial services programs and the specific activities needed to implement those components. Additional information on judicial outreach is addressed in Highway Safety Guideline No. 8, Impaired Driving. 

Quick Links

Program Management | Resource Management | Training & Education | Data & Evaluation

Program Management

Program planning, implementation, and coordination are essential for achieving and sustaining State traffic enforcement and adjudication functions. The State Highway Safety Office (SHSO), in conjunction with State and local court administrators, chief judges, and judicial educators should ensure that State traffic safety judicial education programs are well planned and coordinated. State SHSOs should provide leadership, training, and technical assistance to: 

  • Implement and integrate regular traffic law and safety-related judicial education in judicial education programs for all judges;
  • Generate broad-based support for traffic safety programs by informing all stakeholders, including court administrators and the judges they serve, of comprehensive highway safety plans for traffic enforcement;
  • Coordinate traffic safety programs to include Commercial Motor Vehicle (CMV) safety activities such as the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program;
  • Promote the dissemination of NHTSA-supported judicial traffic safety and education courses through coordination with State judicial educators and nationally based institutions such as the National Center for State Courts, National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, and the National Judicial College; and
  • Support the development and ethical implementation of judicial education programs for State, local, administrative, and Tribal courts that will accomplish the following objectives:
    • Utilize enabling legislation and regulations to provide the public with effective and efficient court services;
    • Provide the impetus for judges to be thoroughly educated on all facets of motor vehicle law;
    • Develop cooperative relationships with other government branches, agencies, and entities, as well as community organizations and traffic safety stakeholders; and
    • Establish qualitative and quantitative performance measures by which the delivery of services can be evaluated.

Resource Management

The SHSO should coordinate with the courts to develop plans that identify the resources necessary to effectively provide efficient traffic law-related services throughout the criminal justice system. The plans should include specific components concerning the allocation of funding, personnel, and facilities and: 

  • Periodic assessment of traffic law-related service demands, and the resources needed to serve the needs of the public;
  • Development of traffic law-related court service plans that address budgetary requirements, staff allocation, and facilities requirements; and
  • Employment of efficient accounting and data processing systems to facilitate prompt and accurate generation, retrieval, and sharing of information and records.

Training and Education

Training and education are essential to support and maintain the delivery of traffic law-related services by the judicial branch of government. To be effective adjudicators, and serve the needs of the public, judges must receive regular education and training of the highest caliber. Judicial education and training should be promoted and, where appropriate, presented by the SHSO or other training entities with experienced faculties in the area of traffic safety, including law and procedure. Judicial education and training should be: 

  • Adequately funded and where possible compulsory as a requirement to maintaining service in office;
  • Provided by State or nationally based judicial education and training entities with experienced faculties in area of traffic-related law and procedure;
  • Inclusive of education components consistent with models developed by the American Bar Association, for example the Code of Judicial Ethics and the Rules of Professional Conduct;
  • Inclusive of case management components so as to foster productivity and the prompt and efficient disposition of cases;
  • Specialized as to curriculum so as to address the needs of both statutory and administrative judges as well as hearing officers; and
  • Assessed regularly so as to ensure that education components address specialized traffic enforcement skills, techniques, or programs such as DWI/Drug Courts.

Data and Evaluation

The SHSO, in conjunction with court administrators, should develop a comprehensive evaluation program to measure progress toward established project goals and objectives. Utilizing comprehensive evaluation programs, the SHSO should effectively plan and implement statewide, county, local, and Tribal traffic safety programs. Such programs should have as objectives the optimization of limited resource allocation and should measure the impact of traffic enforcement on court resources. Data that are collected should include case disposition summaries and reports, and other relevant workload information. Court administrators should: 

  • Include evaluation components in initial program planning so as to ensure that data will be available for evaluation;
  • Ensure that adequate resources and personnel are allocated to program planning and data collection;
  • Regularly report results of program evaluations to project and program managers, legislative decision- makers, and to the public;
  • Utilize results to guide future activities and to assess in justifying resources to governing bodies;
  • Conduct surveys to assist in determining court and program effectiveness, including surveys that measure public knowledge and attitudes about court programs;
  • Evaluate the effectiveness of services provided in support of priority safety programs; and
  • Maintain and report court generated data to appropriate repositories through the use of effective records programs that:
    • Provide records rapidly and accurately;
    • Provide routine compilations of data for management use in the decision-making process;
    • Provide data for operational planning and execution;
    • Interface with a variety of data systems, including statewide traffic safety records systems that are accessible by other State and local governmental entities, agencies, and courts;
    • Provide for the evidentiary integrity of information so as to insure its admissibility in subsequent court and administrative hearing proceedings; and
    • Work with court administrators to use the traffic court functional standards that are available through the National Center for State Courts.

Last updated: March 2025