There were fewer police officers and sheriff’s deputies than usual watching Arizona’s roads for traffic violations this holiday season.
Data from the Arizona Governor’s Office of Highway Safety shows a 41% dropoff in officers and deputies participating in traffic enforcement this past holiday season compared to 2024.
The data covers holidays and weekend days in December and shows that about 4,200 officers worked traffic shifts statewide during that period. In 2024, over 7,000 officers did. In 2023, that number was over 9,000.
The decline in officers went hand in hand with declines in citation statistics. Total traffic stops fell by about 38% from over 26,000 in 2024 to about 18,000 in 2025. Total DUI arrests decreased from 1,354 to 1,084, a decline of about 20%. Civil speed citations fell by more than half, from 7,617 to 3,580.
The Governor’s Office of Highway Safety distributes grants for road safety initiatives to law enforcement agencies across Arizona. Most officers working holiday traffic shifts are paid by state grants, according to the state office’s director, Jesse Torrez. State grant agreements usually require agencies to provide officers to work holiday shifts, and often include overtime funds for that purpose. Agencies then report their holiday man-hours and citation statistics to the office.
According to local reports, the police departments of Tucson, Oro Valley, Marana, Sahuarita, Sierra Vista, Huachuca City and Benson received state highway safety grants for 2026, as well as the University of Arizona Police Department and the sheriffs of Pinal County, Cochise County, Graham County and Santa Cruz County.
Total grant funding distributed by the office to local agencies has been relatively constant over the last four years, typically around $12 million per year.
