SACRAMENTO, Calif. (April 24, 2006) — The Rubber Manufacturers Association (RMA) kicked off its fifth annual National Tire Safety Week at a Goodyear Tire Center today in downtown Sacramento, noting small but definite improvements in consumer tire safety awareness since the event began in 2002.
In this year's RMA consumer survey, 19 percent of respondents knew how to check tire pressure properly, compared with 11 percent in 2002, an RMA spokesman noted. “We're not shouting from the rooftops over 19 percent, but we're showing steady improvement in consumer awareness,” he said.
The association decided to hold the event in Sacramento, instead of the Washington, D.C., area as it did last year. It hadn't held a National Tire Safety Week kickoff in California since 2003, but chose it because California is “a big state with a lot of drivers,” according to the spokesman. “We try not to repeat ourselves too much,” he said. “If you do something the same way all the time, it becomes old hat.”
Officials of the California Highway Patrol, the California Office of Highway Safety and the California office of the American Automobile Association appeared at the event. Jacqueline Glassman, acting administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and Montill Williams, director of public affairs for AAA, appeared in a video press release.