and there are more details tonight surrounding the tragic death of NHL hockey star Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew the accused drunk driver who hid and killed the brothers near their family home in Salem County last Thursday is a high-ranking military officer in the state according to nj.com the driver Sean Higgins is a major in the New Jersey Army National Guard and works at a nonprofit for substance abuse treatment headquartered in Pennsylvania police documents show Higgins admitted to police he drank five or six beers before the crash the Gaudreau's wives and sister posted tributes this weekend on their social media accounts speaking publicly for the first time since the fatal accident vowing to honor their lives now it's been a dangerous year on New Jersey roads according to State Police statistics there have been 407 fatal crashes and 429 fatalities so far that's a roughly 133% increase from last year with still several months remaining on the calendar Sangeeta Badlani knows all too well the grief and pain the Gaudreau familyes experiencing her 11-year-old son was killed by a driver in 2011 after they ran a stop sign she's dedicated her life's work to preventing similar tragedies by creating the Sangeeta Badlani foundation and families for Safe Streets she joins me now Sanigeeta I'm glad to get your Insight for a topic like this when you read about another family losing their children in a preventable tragedy what goes through your mind H so you know every time I read another traffic death it's like the heartbreaking loss of the goodu brothers I reliev the tragedy of losing my beloved suddenly kill in a car crash uh when a driver ran through a stop sign and uh behind every statistic there's a story of unimaginable grief and a loved one that was taken too soon as you may know that each year around 600 people die on New Jersey roadways now these deaths are all preventable as you said these are preventable crashes we need to change the system and the system that we have now is definitely not working and we need to end the Carnage on our roadways through your through your foundation Sangita and through the vision zero Alliance what have you identified that's missing because there have been a number of new laws put on the books you in fact um have helped to Usher some of those reforms through but then what largely are we missing to be able to save another life right so there's a ton that we can do you know there's a lot of things that one can do so first of all we need to thoroughly investigate each traffic death and we need to create safer infrastructure especially biking and walking and then fill the gaps for the biking and walking networks for everyone to ensure that everyone no matter how they travel they can do so safely are bike lanes and and pedestrian Lane Sanita enough I mean because inevitably people get behind the wheel uh intoxicated absolutely they're not enough and that's that's why I say we need to take a holistic approach so you know I talk about biking and walking infrastructure because you see that in urban areas but not soone in so much in the rural areas and that's why I bring that up but I also think we need to equip our police with proven Technologies you know that will enforce for speeding laws we need a state agent gencies to prioritize safety which has not been happening and the state needs to follow the national roadway safety strategy that at the heart of it is the safe system approach which talks about safer roads what does that mean you design the roads in a way that will mitigate human mistakes it recognizes that humans will make errors but our road system should not we should be focusing on safer vehicles that means you know we need to promotee designs and Technologies in these vehicles that will help us to prevent these tragedies we need to set speed limits you know based on the road design and the conditions and we need to have safer Road users to encourage safe and responsible driving behaviors and then the post-crash care which is to improve emergency response and then also the medical care that we can provide to people with these injuries sure and that's why we as Vision zero New Jersey Alliance are urging our state leaders to pass the target zero commission Bill and this bill aims to study examine and review all aspects of traffic safety with Focus specific focus on Equity access and Mobility for all Ro users that will end traffic fatalities by 2040 Sangeeta Badlani thank you so much for your time today thank you