Rob Saka Opposes Traffic Safety In School Zones
Saka's Unhinged Quest Will Make Streets More Dangerous For Our Kids
Common Sense Is Not Common Enough
Any parent knows that busy streets are a danger to kids.
And American roads are uniquely dangerous in the rich world, for a variety of reasons. As the Economist reports, our tendency to buy big means more mayhem, maiming and mortality on our roads. In addition, the traffic calming measures put in place in cities around the globe are too rare in the US.
Although the policy fixes to prevent this high human cost are fairly straightforward, the political consensus does not exist.
The Reasonable Person Standard
Except in school zones.
Pretty much any reasonable person knows that we have to slow down traffic and reduce blind-spots and likely crashes where our babies are likeliest to be on foot.
But there is one person who begs to differ.
His name is Rob Saka, and sadly he is the Transportation Chair of the Seattle City Council, right where the conservative Council President put him.
Hypocrisy on Camera
Saka stood ready to spread enforcement related cameras in primarily poor neighborhoods, even when the ACLU objected on civil liberties grounds that this “chills free speech, deters free association, fuels racial disparity in policing, and provides a false sense of security at the cost of privacy and race equity.”
But when it came time for cameras to slow down speeding in school zones, Saka objected. Erica Barnett reports that “he worried the city was targeting ‘historically marginalized and underrepresented’ communities with the cameras,’” when in fact the cameras are to be deployed primarily in affluent zones.
Barnett also noted that “school zone cameras have proven to be an effective deterrent to speeding in school zones, which in turn reduces collisions between cars and pedestrians, including school children, around schools” and that Rob defended his opposition by saying “our approach needs to be guided by data.”
Setting aside Saka’s cynical use of “equity” and “data” when his policies regularly flout both and when neither are at issue in this discussion, it is difficult to avoid drawing the conclusion that Rob Saka wants to let people speed through school areas.
Rob’s Need For Speed
Or maybe it is just his need for speed.
Because Rob Saka is now pushing to make the area outside a preschool near him even less safe, and wants to take $2M from other projects to do it.
As Erica Barnett also reported (seriously–just take a second and go to her support page and make sure you are contributing to her excellent reporting), a few years ago Saka sent a frivolously theatrical complaint to SDOT about a traffic safety device near his kids’ preschool.
It’s an 8-inch road barrier that prevents illegal left turns in a spot where they are already illegal. Devices like this are kind of a no-brainer if the problem persists, especially given that a quarter of crashes involving pedestrians involve left turns.
Let’s just say Saka did not cover himself in glory–he called the eight inch left-turning barrier “traumatizing” to immigrants and then compared it to Trump’s border wall. The Publicola piece lays out more of his histrionics, if you are interested.
Setting aside the hilarious unseriousness of Saka’s writing, the sad fact is that Saka is using real human suffering as a shield for his quest to drive faster or turn left in a place where doing so endangers the actual lives of children.
You’d think a year of campaigning and another year of “governing” would have taught him to do better.
You’d think that the anguished news coverage of a 3-year old being killed by a truck in Bellevue a few weeks ago might have shown him that his quest to stop safety in school zones is quixotic and cruel.
But no, it did nothing of the sort.
Because now Rob is demanding that SDOT spend $2 million to rip that barrier out.
This from a guy who repeatedly pretended he was going to “audit the budget” for “efficiencies.” Now he wants to waste $2 million of your money to make kids less safe so people can speed and violate the law and so some other actually worthy project does not get funded.
The fact that this is almost certainly about his own convenience reeks of corruption, even if it is not straightforwardly illegal. And the fact that it increases risks to children for his own convenience is straightforwardly morally repugnant.
Now Dan Strauss is the budget chair, which gives me some hope of stopping this. Strauss may frequently frustrate progressives, but he is a legitimate moderate Democrat who has been on the right side of a few important issues this year.
Still, he has got his work cut out for him with Sara Nelson’s reactionary and conservative council power center. I sure hope he can put a stop to this madness. If not him, then Harrell.
In the meantime, we can at least look forward to Saka’s “Mr. Harrell, Tear Down This Wall!” speeches.