Thursday, January 29, 2009 Super Bowl day drinkers' service started with single scooter
Scooter Patrol, which offers rides year-round, will be at Tsunami Sushi in Sunset Beach on Sunday.
SUNSET BEACH – Beer and junk food seem to be synonymous with Super Bowl Sunday, but a local nonprofit warns that getting behind the wheel after the big game could ruin all the fun.
Scooter Patrol, an organization that looks to keep drunk drivers off the road year-round, will offer transportation services Sunday to patrons of Tsunami Sushi in Sunset Beach.
And the offer is more than tempting. It's free. Your car goes with you. You arrive safely home and keep other drivers safe in the process, organizers said.
"Super Bowl Sunday is one of the worst days of the year for drunk driving," said Scooter Patrol founder Anthony Panzica. "We're looking forward to making our community safer… by providing free rides home.''
Panzica, 42, of Seal Beach, started the patrol as a one-man show in 2003 using an old scooter with a light duct-taped to the front.
His endeavor quickly grew as friends stepped up to help with the service and sponsors started showing interest.
"This is my way of helping my community," Panzica said. "It's really heartening and humbling to be in a position where we're saving people's lives."
Today, GoPed provides the scooters, Scott's Motor Sports offers maintenance services and 15 volunteers are signed up as drivers.
Although the Scooter Patrol will focus on Sunset Beach and Seal Beach on Sunday, they also provide services for Huntington Beach, Huntington Harbour and Newport Beach from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. every Friday and Saturday. They also offer a reservation service for people going out on off days.
The Scooter Patrol usually visits bars early on the weekends to let patrons know of the service. They field about six to 10 calls a night, on average, and pick up people from Main Street in Huntington Beach to Belmont Shore in Long Beach.
Tsunami Sushi is one of the Patrol's early supporters. This will be the sixth year the Scooter Patrol has offered its services at the restaurant's annual Sunday-Funday Super Bowl Party, when the Arizona Cardinals take on the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Scooter Patrol will have a booth at the restaurant ready to cart away intoxicated football fans up to 10 miles from the bar. They also will offer their on-call service in other Sunset Beach and Seal Beach locations.
Designated drivers take bar-goers home in their own car, return the keys then zip back via scooter.
If safety isn't a priority for a partygoer, perhaps avoiding an expensive driving-under-the-influence charge would be enough incentive to take Scooter Patrol up on their offer, organizers said.
The Office of Safety and Traffic this year was awarded about $165,000 in grants for law enforcement agencies to step up their DUI checkpoint efforts in eight Orange County cities including Tustin and Laguna Beach, according to Register archives.
OST named Super Bowl Sunday as one of the premier holidays for police to host a sobriety checkpoint -- right up there with St. Patrick's Day and New Year's Eve.
Scooter Patrol also offers a reservation service for people going out on off days.
Contact the writer: 714-445-6692 or jfletcher@ocregister.com
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