National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
Agency overview
FormedDecember 31, 1970; 53 years ago (1970-12-31)
Preceding agency
  • National Highway Safety Bureau[1]
JurisdictionU.S. motor vehicles[2]
HeadquartersWashington, D.C., U.S.
Motto"People saving people"[3]
Employees626 (FY 2017)[4][5]
Annual budget$1.6 billion (FY 2024)[6]
Agency executives
  • Sophie Shulman, Acting Administrator
  • Sophie Shulman, Deputy Administrator
Parent departmentDepartment of Transportation
Websitenhtsa.gov
Footnotes
Leadership[7]

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA /ˈnɪtsə/ NITS-ə)[8] is an agency of the U.S. federal government, part of the Department of Transportation, focused on transportation safety in the United States.

NHTSA is charged with writing and enforcing Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards as well as regulations for motor vehicle theft resistance and fuel economy, as part of the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) system. FMVSS 209 was the first standard to become effective on March 1, 1967. NHTSA licenses vehicle manufacturers and importers, allows or blocks the import of vehicles and safety-regulated vehicle parts, administers the vehicle identification number (VIN) system, develops the anthropomorphic dummies used in U.S. safety testing as well as the test protocols themselves, and provides vehicle insurance cost information. The agency has asserted preemptive regulatory authority over greenhouse gas emissions, but this has been disputed by such state regulatory agencies as the California Air Resources Board.[citation needed]

The Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards are contained in the United States 49 CFR 571. Additional federal vehicle standards are contained elsewhere in the CFR. Another of NHTSA's activities is the collection of data about motor vehicle crashes, available in various data files maintained by the National Center for Statistics and Analysis, in particular the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), the Crash Investigation Sampling System (CISS, where technicians investigate a random sample of police crash reports), and others.[9]

  1. ^ "Who We Are and What We Do". National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Archived from the original on October 18, 2015. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
  2. ^ "National Highway Traffic Safety Administration". International Trade Data System. Archived from the original on September 23, 2015. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
  3. ^ "THIS IS NHTSA" (PDF). National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 5, 2016. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
  4. ^ "Budget Estimates, Fiscal Year 2018" (PDF). National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. United States Department of Transportation. Retrieved September 9, 2021.
  5. ^ "Budget Estimates Fiscal Year 2016 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration" (PDF). U.S. Department of Transportation. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 21, 2015. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
  6. ^ "Budget Estimates, Fiscal Year 2025" (PDF). National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. United States Department of Transportation. Retrieved April 4, 2024.
  7. ^ "NHTSA Leadership". NHTSA. August 2021. Retrieved August 31, 2021.
  8. ^ Calmes, Jackie (April 5, 2014). "Minding the Minders of G.M." New York Times.
  9. ^ "Crash Investigation Sampling System". www.nhtsa.gov. NHTSA. Retrieved July 8, 2023.