February 2026 | The New Jersey Police Chief Magazine 14
A CHIEF’ S PERSPECTIVE: TURNING THE CORNER ON TRAFFIC FATALITIES –
AND THE WORK AHEAD
Chief Michael Morris( Ret) and Chief William Parenti( Ret) DHTS Law Enforcement Liaisons
After a devastating year in 2024, when New Jersey experienced a 30-year high in traffic fatalities, 2025 brought cautious optimism. Preliminary figures released by the New Jersey State Police show traffic deaths declined from 684 in 2024 to approximately 575 in 2025, a 15 % reduction statewide.
For New Jersey’ s police chiefs, this improvement is encouraging, but it is not a signal to ease our efforts. Instead, it reinforces a critical lesson: coordinated enforcement, data-driven strategies, and unified leadership save lives.
Across the state, chiefs and command staff have leaned into regional partnerships and task-force models that emphasize accountability, shared intelligence, and sustained visibility.
In Atlantic County, the CARE Task Force“ County of Atlantic Reduction and Enforcement” continues to demonstrate the value of cross-jurisdictional collaboration. Using common preliminary data, Atlantic County recorded approximately 17 traffic fatalities in 2025, down from approximately 24 fatalities in 2024, representing an estimated 29 % decrease year over year.
Similarly, Monmouth County’ s coordinated, data-driven enforcement efforts have shown measurable impact. Preliminary data indicates approximately 15 traffic fatalities in 2025, compared with roughly 39 fatalities in 2024, an estimated 62 % reduction.
Middlesex County, one of the state’ s most densely populated regions, recorded approximately 48 fatalities in 2025, compared with approximately 48 fatalities in 2024, reflecting a relatively flat year-over-year trend amid sustained traffic volume and complex roadway conditions.
While pedestrian fatalities declined statewide from 230 deaths in 2024 to approximately 173 in 2025, they remain a central concern for law enforcement executives. Chiefs understand that pedestrian safety is not solely an engineering or education issue, it is an enforcement and public-trust issue.
At the statewide level, the New Jersey State Association of Chiefs of Police continues to advance the Goal Zero philosophy: the belief that zero deaths, zero serious injuries, and zero crashes is not aspirational rhetoric, but a leadership responsibility. Through policy guidance, peer-to-peer engagement, and executive-level advocacy, NJSACOP has helped normalize treating traffic safety as a public-health mission and framing enforcement as crash prevention, not citation counts.
The launch of New Jersey’ s Target Zero initiative further institutionalizes this approach, reinforcing the Safe System framework and identifying high-injury corridors that demand focused attention.
For New Jersey’ s chiefs, the message of 2025 is clear: progress is possible, leadership matters, and collaboration saves lives.
Chief Michael J. Morris, Ret. Law Enforcement Liaison South: NJ Division of Highway Traffic Safety / NJSACOP mmorris @ njsacop. org 609-226-7620 Chief William G. Parenti, Ret. Law Enforcement Liaison North: NJ Division of Highway Traffic Safety / NJSACOP wparenti @ njsacop. org 908-472-6392