October 4th, 20224

Dear Esteemed Members of Covina City Council, 

First and foremost thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. My name is Susan Gutierrez and I'm a resident and active member of my community here in Covina. I’m not only a mother of a 16 year old, but a “Scout Mom” as I’ve been volunteering with the Boy Scouts of America Greater Los Angeles Area Scouting organization more than  10 years and currently serve as Cubmaster for our local Pack 443 charted by First Presbyterian Church of Covina where we serve K-5th grade students in our Covina, West Covina, Baldwin Park, La Puente, Glendora, Irwindale and our surrounding communities. I'm also a small business owner in the City of Covina and work as a consultant to small businesses entering the Government and Public Work Space. I am also a member of the Covina Woman's Club, the oldest service club in Covina. 

The purpose of my letter today is to share my sincere concern over the most recent death of an Azusa High School Student in front of Northview High School here in Covina. The student was on his way to school on the morning of Monday September 30th at about 7:20am riding eastbound on Cypress Avenue when he was struck by a vehicle also traveling Eastbound. 

Although a current investigation is underway and many details are still unknown. There is one truth we can all agree on, someone’s child will not be returning home today. Someone’s child will not be returning to youth group this Wednesday to worship. 

This incident has really hit home, this child, young man had a bright future, believed in God, worshiped each week at one of our local churches, attended Forest Home for youth summer camp - a place where my own son goes to every year, and where over 20,000 youth attend each summer to seek a closer relationship to God, away from drugs and the streets, Alejandro was a good boy, a good friend, a brother and a good son to his family. 

Unfortunately, Alejandro’s incident is not the only one of the many pedestrians involved in horrific and deadly street accidents which continue to occur in our little town of Covina.  

This is something that is becoming more and more common, car drivers are far more distracted due to phone use while driving, they drive reckless, or speed because they are often in a hurry or simply distracted for one reason or another. 

Regardless of the reasons, as a community what can we do? To what extent can we take responsibility or offer solutions to educate our community of the impact this is having on our families who can’t even let their kids ride to school anymore or walk like we used to? 

As a City, we should set an example and we should consider offering simple solutions to educate our drivers. 

First, it's so important to take a step back and really re-analyze what are some of those those driving patterns taking place in our streets and review that data, re-survey those busy areas and highly traffic streets and survey those surrounding streets that are closest to schools where children walk and ride their bike to schools daily. 

 

Current Issues & Proposal Solutions 

 

• Speed Limit Signs Not Consistent near Schools Sites
  The department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) defines a school zone as the area around a school building and its ground, including the road that approaches or passes the school. The speed limit in a school zone is 25mph when children are present. 
  Speed limit signs near Covina Schools are not consistent with current DMV and transportation codes
  The law is 25mph in a school zone within 1000 feet of a school, in some areas near the high schools there are still 40mph signs or no clear signage of 25mph signs within some of those vicinities 
  Proposal: New Survey surrounding all elementary, middle and high schools areas within ½ of mile of the surrounding area. Proposal: Engineer speed studies to possibly re-consider / re-zone  speed limits in specific areas of the city including but limited to : schools, parks, narrow streets and areas with high pedestrian use
• Lacking of Public Service Announcements
  Proposal: Provide Mailers and/or city announcements when new lights are put in place, signage. Reminding drivers to drive slow through various forms of media (flyers, mailers, social media)
  Most resident’s don’t even know we have bike lanes or don't know what they are.
• Lacking of Community Awareness
  Proposal : Community Outreach at events to remind the public of safe driving
  With this, we can then encourage our community to go out and walk and bike commute, and utilize public transportation because it will be considered normal.
• Bike Paths are not clearly visible
  Proposal: Repaint bike lanes , in most cities bike lanes are bright green
  Some cities have speed bumps or dividers / protectors dividing the bike lanes from regular car lanes
• Bike Riding in Some areas of the City is Not Invited
  Inconsistent with bike paths and lanes created in the city
  Proposal: Update street Signage where necessary
• Inconsistency at Crosswalks as they do not offer Push Buttons “Pedestrian Beg Button” 
  For example : San Bernardino Road and 4th Avenue & Badillo and 4th Avenue
  Highly crossed street by pedestrians
  No Push Button Present
  Proposal : Audit / Re-survey those areas in need of a Push Buttons, for example near Covina Park
• Covina Streets (Arrow Hwy, Cypress Avenue , San Bernardino Road, Badillo Avenue, Citrus Avenue and Azusa Avenue) Used as  Thorough-Fares
  Proposal: Re-direct that traffic whenever possible to move towards Arrow Hwy when possible. As its original intent. 
  Long Term Proposal : Consider creating Traffic Islands on Cypress, San Bernardino Road and Badillo near Covina Park or possibly add speed bumps where possible. 

 

In most cases, children and pedestrians do not have a sense of detecting street danger. More often these days, pedestrians are walking with headphones. The solution to this is to encourage drivers to simply slow down. 

This starts with us, our city, city officials, and public works, our residents, our families.

We need to re-analyze where new signs need to be placed or replaced with new ordinances, and even consider lowering the speed limits in some of these areas where pedestrians cross each day. 

One example is our near Covina Park, which I happen to live across the street from. Where just a couple of weeks ago 2 people , on 2 separate days, were hit directly in front of the park when crossing, using a sidewalk. 

 

Our founding fathers and mothers could never even imagine the impact of building those first roads, and the amount of people who would eventually drive through them each day. They never imagined in a million years the amount of people who eventually drive through our beautiful city each day. 

The envisioned, growing families, children playing, neighbors and organizations like the Women’s Club, like the Rotary, and our council members building a little town where everyone knows each other. That small town feel. 

We have to evolve, and as a city we’ve grown past that small town in sense due to traffic. But one thing has not changed, our values, our care for one another and our community and the willingness to come together for our neighbors. 

This is urgent, this a matter of public safety, this our children and our families. We need to do what we can as a community and come together  and find realistic solutions and stop a moment and take a look at what we currently have and how we can improve it. 

There is no doubt about , traffic in our city will increase as population continues to grow. Kids will continue walking to school and riding their bikes. But as a community its our obligation to be up to date with those growing trends. 

Our families lives are at stake, our children. 

Alejandro was killed that day in one of  the most innocent acts, riding his bike. He was riding his bike to school. It doesn't matter how you look at it, he was riding his bike innocently on his way to school. 

The person who hit him, I can assure you  didn’t mean to hit him. In fact, he was probably on his way to work to better himself, to help family, hoping to return to his family  that afternoon. 

 

Council, my request today is for you to seriously review this list of suggestions again and re-evaluate how we can improve, how we can make it better so that we know we did the best we could with the responsibility that was assigned to us. It’s with the request that you help in providing public safety.

I want to thank you sincerely for your time today and leave you with a thought. Some of our basic, fundamental growth milestones that we learn as children are to walk, and for some of us we even learn to ride a bike. It’s one of those freedoms closest to driving a car. But when we think about it, simply put, it’s an innocent act and no-one ever should, no child should ever have to pass away while on his way to school while riding his bike.  

 

As a community what can we do? What will you do and how can you help? 

 

With Sincere Respect,  

 

Susan “Suzie” Gutierrez and Community Residents