The Southern California Association of Governments hosted regional workshops this summer as a follow up to their Traffic Safety Symposium which happened in May. The workshops occurred in Los Angeles/Ventura, Orange, Imperial and the Inland Empire. Each of the workshops included panelists from the transportation sector, public agencies and community organizations. Our Inland Empire staff, Demi Espinoza, was invited as a panelist to discuss traffic safety, equity and Safe Routes to School within the areas of Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. Demi presented on prior equity and safety work in the Inland Empire and regionally on Vision Zero advocacy. Other panelists included San Bernardino County’s Mark Friis, Melanie Mullis from Ontario, City of Riverside’s Nathan Mustafa and Eric Ceja from Palm Desert. Keynote speakers included Chris Gray from the Western Riverside Council of Governments. Sobering statistics were included SCAG’s presentation on regional data, including that 1,500 people are killed in collisions every year in Southern California. The workshop ended with an opportunity for cross departmental public agency teams to brainstorm strategies for traffic safety work plans. SCAG also released a safety pledge for public officials to join efforts to build safer walking and biking in communities across Southern California. To learn more about the pledge and how to get involved in traffic safety efforts, please visit SCAG’s website here.
