A recently formed program called Ground Control is an effort put forth by Illumina Records to raise awareness to prevent drunk driving. Illumina Records is a record company that features up-and-coming local artists, and is using them to help promote their Ground Control project.

In return, those artists who participate in the program receive more promotion and exposure for themselves and their bands. The purpose of Ground Control is to use music as a vehicle to prevent drunk driving. The president of Illumina Records, Ronald Bellanti, came up with the idea for Ground Control after witnessing a fatal accident before an Illumina Records concert that occurred because of several drunk teenagers who thought that it would be a good idea to fool around with their cars in a parking lot.

"It was easy to see that even with the plethora of programs available that lots of kids were being skipped over. I wanted to do something about that," said Bellanti. "We have one mission, to educate teenagers and young adults about the dangers of driving drunk, to show them that they have choices. We show them that they can in fact choose life."

Bellanti also stated that, "We really have to work at keeping the attention of young people today." To keep that attention, Illumina Records and Ground Control promote their program through concerts, music compilation CDs, speeches, school assemblies and fashion shows.

This year, Illumina Records and Ground Control will be producing a nationwide series of internet advertisements and will be sending them out directly to over 10 million Americans. To further back their cause, Ground Control provides statistics on their Web site concerning drunk driving and underage teen drinking.

Some of the facts that one could expect to find on Ground Control's Web site are that a victim of drunk driving in America dies ever 32 minutes, that more than three million teens are alcoholics, that two in five Americans will be involved in an alcohol-related crash sometime in their life, that the typical American child will be exposed to 160,000 to 180,000 beer ads before they are legally old enough to drink and that 70 percent of adolescents age 13 to 14 have consumed alcohol by the time they reach eighth grade.

Anyone who would like more information about Illumina Records, its artists and its mission can visit the Illumina Records Web site at www.illuminarecords.com, or the MySpace page at www.MySpace.com/illuminalaunch/005. Media Credit: Illuminarecords.com Artists represented by Illumina Records have pulled together to help put an end to drunk driving. The performers have created a prevention campaign that incorporates singing to save lives. www.themichiganjournal.com