ROCKPORT — Motorists driving through Rockport throughout the coming week are being warned to take extra care to buckle up.

The Rockport Police Department is partnering with the Massachusetts State Police and other local law enforcement agencies to crack down on all motorists not wearing seat belts as part of a special "Click It or Ticket" enforcement campaign.

Police departments participating in the program across the state are stepping up enforcement patrols and increasing other efforts to drive home the message — "Click It or Ticket" — day and night.

The enforcement mobilization began in Rockport on Friday, and will continue through the Thanksgiving weekend, said Rockport Police Sgt. Timothy Frithsen.

Although drivers cannot be pulled over for simply not wearing their seat belt, drivers and passengers should be aware that, if they are pulled over for some other infraction and are not wearing their seat belts, they will be ticketed and fined, according to the state program.

The campaign is the third aggressive "Click It or Ticket" mobilization of the year, boosted by a $660,000 federal highway grant given to the state's Executive Office of Public Safety and Security.

On the national level, the project is rooted in highway safety. Statistics show that 55 percent of all motor vehicle occupants killed in crashes across the country were not wearing their seat belts at the time of the crash.

And the numbers in Massachusetts are even worse; in 2008, 64 percent of motor vehicle occupants who died on the state's roadways were not buckled up, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Statistics also show that, in 2009, more than 25 percent of Massachusetts' residents fail to regularly wear their seat belts when driving or riding in a motor vehicle.

Material from the Associated Press was used in this report by Jonathan L'Ecuyer, who can be reached at 978-283-7000 x 3451 or jlecuyer@gloucestertimes.com.