Sims launches Pedestrian Safety Task Force after tragic accident

Just a week after a tragic accident killed a two-year-old girl in Auburn, King County Executive Ron Sims announced the creation of a special regional task force to explore ways to stop the alarming number of vehicle and pedestrian accidents in South County, which have taken almost 50 lives since 1990.

“My heart broke when I heard the news of that little girl being killed,” said Sims. “As a parent, I could only imagine the terrible sense of loss by the family and the pain the driver must have also gone through. We’re not here today to point fingers. We’re here to find solutions to this problem so perhaps another family won’t have to go through this terrible grief of losing a child.”

Sims asked Dr. Abe Bergman, head of the Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center, to head up the task force along with John Moffat, director of the Washington Traffic Safety Council, and find out why pedestrians are so much more vulnerable in South County than other parts of King County. There have been more than 900 vehicle-pedestrian accidents in the area since 1990, injuring almost 950 persons, and claiming 48 lives.

Sims asked Bergman and Moffat to bring together local officials, school officials, law enforcement agencies, businesses and others to identify the causes and possible remedies. The task force is to make an initial report to Sims in 90 days.

Bergman and Moffat were joined at the news conference in Auburn City Hall by Dr. Susanne Fiala, a family practice doctor in Kent, whose own child was seriously injured in a collision with a truck in Kent in 1995.

“We’ve got to get to the bottom of this,” said Sims. “I know some say King County should stick to running the buses and the sewer, but if we can save one life it's worth whatever effort the county can make to solve this problem.

Updated: Feb. 28, 1997