The public meeting is scheduled for 11 a.m. at City Hall. If the committee’s members approve the proposal, they may ask to review it again at a future meeting, possibly with changes, or they may send it to the full City Council for a vote.
The man who was fatally struck in North Sacramento at Bell and Norwood avenues Wednesday evening joined a list of 18 other cyclists and pedestrians to die in the California capital this year: Mattie Nicholson, 56;Kate Johnston, 55; Jeffrey Blain, 59; Aaron Ward, 40; Sam Dent, 41; Terry Lane, 55; David Rink, 51; James Lind, 54; Tyler Vandehei, 32; Jose Valladolid Ramirez, 36; Larry Winters, 76; Sau Voong, 84; Johnnie A. Fite, 82; Robert Kohler Jr., 50; Edward Lopez, 61; Muhammad Saddique, 64; Azure Amonti Daniels, 48; and Jordan Nicolas Rodriguez, 38. Two more people — Geohaira “Geo” Sosa, 32, and Kaylee Xiong, 18 — were killed this summer while riding electric scooters.
The remaining 10 people who have died this year were motorists.
UC Berkeley’s Transportation Injury Mapping System shows that since Sacramento leaders’ “Vision Zero” promise in 2017 to eliminate all traffic fatalities and serious injuries on city streets by 2027, vehicle crashes have killed more than 250 people.
Vice Mayor Caity Maple submitted the initial paperwork for the state of emergency declaration in September, shortly after the death of Daniels, who was fatally struck Sept. 12 while she crossed Sutterville Road outside of Sacramento City College. If the City Council passes the resolution, it would reaffirm elected officials’ commitment to Vision Zero.
The initial draft contains language directing the city manager to identify funding for a public awareness campaign. Echoing Councilwoman Katie Valenzuela, the draft also calls for a “quick-build” program, which could help Sacramento reach its safety goals through the use of targeted lower-cost interventions in the aftermath of dangerous crashes.
However, the draft does not direct City Manager Howard Chan to allocate money for such a program. Currently, amid a city budget shortfall of $77 million, the Department of Public Works relies almost entirely on unreliable grant funding for its road safety projects.
Some Urge Infrastructure Changes Over Police
The draft stipulates that the Sacramento Police Department should ramp up its enforcement of traffic violations that particularly endanger pedestrians, which has received significant criticism from the public. At a news conference Sept. 16, Maple said that element was an “interim” measure.“The built environment is a really important component of this, and that’s where we’re gonna need the money — we do have to make sure that our streets are designed in a way that actually forces people to go slower and to make different decisions,” she said. “But in the interim, we also really need people to know that they will be held accountable.”
Alena Wong, 17, said that increased policing would be an ineffective strategy.
Wong was almost killed while using a Land Park crosswalk on her way to her middle school in 2019. She hit the button to trigger the pedestrian crossing beacon on Sutterville Road at Mead Avenue. Because she was on her bicycle, Wong, then 12, was technically subject to vehicle codes and did not have the right of way. Meanwhile, the driver who hit her was obeying the speed limit: 35 mph, a speed that Sacramento officials consider lethal. The United Nations and the World Health Organization have jointly said that 20 mph should be the maximum speed limit in urban centers.
Wong said she hoped Sacramento would invest in changing roads to coax or force drivers to slow down. Five years after the crash, she and her parents are still advocating for the city to install a roundabout at the intersection where she almost died.
Kiara Reed, executive director of the transportation advocacy group Civic Thread, agreed that funding for improvements was essential. Without that money, she thought the emergency declaration could amount to “just a statement that doesn’t really have any teeth.”
This year, the City Council declined to earmark $10.7 million in the 2024-2025 fiscal year to fund the Active Transportation Commission’s recommendations, which were largely geared toward people navigating the city by bicycle or on foot.
The pedestrian killed in North Sacramento’s Robla neighborhood was identified by the Sacramento County Coroner’s Office as a 64-year-old man, but his name has yet to be released.
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