OAKLAND — Steps away from the Foothill Boulevard crosswalk at 26th Avenue where a 6-year-old boy and his mother were struck by a car and killed Saturday night, the victims’ family members, friends and neighbors begged city officials Monday morning to stop people from driving dangerously fast on the street — as they’ve done for years.
During the gathering, a white car zoomed past, infuriating the crowd of a few dozen.
Noel Gallo, the council member for the area, looked the people in the eyes, and promised to make the intersection — which sits between a three-story apartment building and a busy laundromat where the victims were headed — safer for them. The crosswalk is in the middle of a half-mile gap between traffic lights at 23rd Avenue and 28th Avenue; four pedestrians have been hit by cars and injured on that stretch of road from May 2017 to May 2018, according to California Highway Patrol data.
“We recognize what needs to be done; sadly, in Oakland sometimes it takes a serious accident like this for us to move immediately,” Gallo said in an interview.
Police identified 27-year-old Rasenoch Allen as the driver in the hit-and-run that killed Angel Garcia and his mother, Alma Vasquez, 30, and left the boy’s 20-year-old uncle critically injured shortly before sunset Saturday. The three pedestrians had entered a marked crosswalk when they were struck by a two-door black Mercedes going west on Foothill. The vehicle continued without stopping.
Police later found the Mercedes abandoned in another area of Oakland.
Allen served prison time for driving a car involved in a 2016 fatal shooting in Oakland, and was released in March 2018. Months later, he and three other men were arrested for armed robbery in Humboldt County. Allen was released on $50,000 bail, and was scheduled to appear in court May 21.
By 4 p.m. Monday afternoon, Allen had not been arrested, authorities said. Oakland police ask anyone with information about Allen to call Oakland police traffic investigators at 510-777-8540 or Crime Stoppers at 510-777-8572. Up to $25,000 in reward money is being offered by police and Crime Stoppers of Oakland for information leading to his arrest.
Oakland Department of Transportation director Ryan Russo, who also went to the crash scene Monday morning, said the department immediately started assessing traffic movements at the intersection to see what could be done, and will report back to Gallo in the next week. In the short term, he said, the striping and signage at the crosswalk could be improved; there is currently only a white, striped crosswalk with faded paint. Before doing that, though, the department must make sure it does not somehow make traffic safety worse, Russo said.
Eleanor Alderman, principal at International Community School, where the boy attended kindergarten, and other neighbors urged the city to put up a traffic light at the intersection, and a stop sign in the meantime.
As it stands now, she said, the crosswalk does little for pedestrians’ safety.
“The family was in a clearly marked crosswalk and were still run down,” Alderman said.
Russo said putting a traffic light at the intersection is a possibility and the department will look into it, given the long gap between traffic lights. A new traffic signal would cost somewhere from $400,000 to $500,000, he said, and the city usually seeks out state grant funds to pay for them.
The stretch of Foothill isn’t considered one of the city’s “high-injury corridors,” which get priority for safety improvements, said Department of Transportation spokesman Sean Maher. Other sections of the street are more prone to deadly collisions. From 2012 to 2016, there were only two pedestrian vs. vehicle crashes on that portion of Foothill — both involved bicycles and neither were severe, he said. Maher said the city typically looks at the number of severe and fatal injuries to set funding priorities, and looks at data across longer time frames. The CHP data from 2017 to 2018 is still provisional, he said.
A GoFundMe fund-raising account page set up early Sunday evening by Alderman had raised $23,529 by 4 p.m. Monday
“Our ICS community is fundraising for funeral expenses for both mother and son and any additional support dad will need,” said a page statement.
Gallo said enforcement needs to be stepped up to punish those who drive recklessly and put others at risk.
“It’s not the street that hurts people, it’s the driver,” Gallo said.
— Eureka Times-Standard City Editor Ruth Schneider contributed to this report.