Salome High School hosts prom safety assembly ahead of April 25 dance

A few days before Salome High School’s April 25 prom, students heard a blunt warning about what one impaired drive can trigger in La Paz County: sheriff’s deputies, Care Flight, fire crews, court costs and a ruined weekend.

The Prom Week assembly was organized by the La Paz County Education Agency, and the school said it was grateful for the event and thanked Superintendent Lewis for putting it together. The timing fit a campus calendar already crowded with spring activities, but the message was aimed squarely at the one night students are most likely to make a dangerous choice after the dance.

That choice carries steep consequences in Arizona. State public safety guidance says drivers 21 and older can be charged with DUI at 0.08% blood alcohol content or higher, while drivers under 21 face a zero-tolerance standard. Arizona Senate research says it is a class 1 misdemeanor for a person under 21 to drive or be in actual physical control of a motor vehicle with any spirituous liquor in the body. A first DUI offense can bring jail time, a $250 base fine, a 90-day to one-year license suspension and ignition interlock requirements.

Those warnings landed in a county where enforcement is spread thin across a huge area. The La Paz County Sheriff’s Office says its patrol division covers nearly 4,500 square miles, split into three districts and served by four substations. The agency is also a participating member of the Arizona DUI Task Force, a fact that makes a teen driving safety presentation especially local, not theoretical.

The school’s own calendar lists prom for April 25, and Salome High School is still marking its 70th year as the Frogs after celebrating that milestone in May 2025. For a campus with that kind of history, the assembly tied tradition to responsibility: getting students to the dance is only part of the job, getting them home safely matters more.

The risk is highest in the same stretch of the year when prom season peaks. Safe and Sober says one third of teen drunk-driving fatalities happen between April and June. In a night that can already include an ambulance call, an emergency room visit, a deputy stop and a suspended license, the safest plan is the one made before the keys are in a pocket.