The announcement this week that Colorado Springs police planned to end DUI checkpoints in favor of saturation patrols seemed to sound the death knell for the roadblocks some claim are unconstitutional.

Maybe not.

 Instead of police officers or sheriff’s deputies, Colorado State Patrol troopers would be the ones checking for drunken drivers if the state continues the roadblocks next summer in Colorado Springs, said Stacey Stegman, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Transportation.

“We’re disappointed in the decision,” Stegman said Thursday. “We believe checkpoints are a very effective deterrent.”

State patrol spokeswoman trooper Heather Cobler said the state patrol has the authority to enforce the law anywhere in the state, including within Colorado Springs city limits.

However, Stegman said DUI checkpoints run by the state patrol would most likely be on interstates or state highways.

In Colorado Springs, that includes Interstate 25, U.S. 24, Colorado 115 and Powers Boulevard. Those roads have often been where checkpoints were located in recent years.

El Paso County is consistently among the leading counties in the state for alcohol-related traffic fatalities, along with Denver and Jefferson, Stegman said.

“We know how much of a problem drinking and driving is in El Paso county and we want to see a variety of enforcement tactics,” she said.

Interim Police Chief Pete Carey told the Colorado Springs City Council on Tuesday that sobriety checkpoints had proved ineffective while tying up a large number of officers, and the department planned to switch to other strategies to catch or deter drunken drivers.

Police took over the checkpoints from the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office, which ran them from 2007 until 2010.

The Sheriff’s Office pulled out for the same reason as the Police Department: a lot of effort for little result, said Sheriff’s Office spokesman Sgt. Mike Schaller.

In 2007, he said, an average of 13 people were arrested at checkpoints. During 2010, sometimes only one person would be arrested at a checkpoint, Schaller said.

During the most recent checkpoint run by the police in September, 679 drivers were stopped and two arrested on suspicion of drunken driving.

Stegman said the low number of arrests at checkpoints is proof of how effective they are in combating drunken driving.

“The goal isn’t only to arrest people,” she said. “It’s to deter people from drinking and driving at all.

Critics have called the checkpoints a violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches, but the checkpoints have been upheld as constitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Colorado began sobriety checkpoints in 2003 and have continued them since with federal funding from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The money is doled out by CDOT to local law enforcement for high-visibility DUI enforcement, which can include saturation patrols as well as checkpoints. Agencies receiving the grants must have five checkpoints a year, with at least two on holidays.

Colorado Springs police received $45,000 for this year’s checkpoints, which typically run from the Memorial Day to Labor Day holiday weekends.

Funding would be available for saturation patrols, but the department could lose a $250,000 mobile blood alcohol testing vehicle CDOT gave it a few years ago if it no longer is going to do checkpoints, Stegman said.

“We’re going to have to see what the best use of our resources is,” she said.

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Contact Ryan Maye Handy

CSPD Officer Kristy Bradigan, left, goes through roadside sobriety manuevers with a driver stopped during the DUI checkpoint set up on Platte Ave. near Chelton Rd. in this 2006 file photo. Photo by THE GAZETTE FILE

Kevin Kreck