MADD's 25th Anniversary     

(Texas square for the 25th anniversary quilt was donated by Marie Brown of Georgetown, TX)

Since MADD's inception in 1980, much progress has been made at the local, state and national levels to reduce drunk driving. Here in Texas, MADD was very active in changing the legal drinking age to 21 (1986), working with the state legislature to lower the legal limit of intoxication to .08 BAC (1999), implementing a "zero tolerance" for underage drinking (1997), helping pass an Administrative License Revocation law (1995), revising the state's penal code(1993), Child Endangerment law, Mandatory Blood Draw on BAC crashes, and the Driver Responsibility Act (2003) and pushing for stronger laws to help the victims of drunk driving (ongoing). In fact, MADD, Texas has been recognized by our national office for excellence in the public policy arena.

At the 2005 National Conference in Grapevine, TX, MADD Gulf Area received the Fundraising Achievment Award for fundraising efforts, and its Executive Director, Linda Kitizaki, received the Robert C. Shearouse Employee of the Year Award recognizing her 16 years of service with MADD.

The Texas state organization was the recipient of the 2002 Heart of MADD Award, presented at MADD's National Conference in Anchorage, Alaska.  This award reflected the state's efforts in building a strong victim services program and outreach to victims of drunk driving crime. 

On September 9, 2000, at MADD's National Conference in Washington, DC, Texas MADD received two President's Awards. The first was the Distinguished Service Award For Efforts to Combat Underage Drinking which recognized the Power Camp program sponsored by MADD, Texas and the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission. The Jean Moorhead Duffy Award was also presented to MADD, Texas for our accomplishment of helping to pass the .08 blood alcohol concentration law during the 1999 session of the Texas Legislature.

In 1998, the MADD, Heart of Texas Chapter received the Flagstaff International Film Festival Gold Award for the video "Teen Drinking: You Don't Have To Do It." MADD participated in this video by providing victim survivors who told their stories.