Only a few hours after West Hollywood Councilmembers sat through a sheriff’s report Tuesday evening showing how “traffic violence” had surged to levels several officials called a public safety crisis, a person was hit by a car at North Olive Drive and West Sunset Boulevard.
The sheriff’s annual report showed 991 traffic collision investigations in 2025, up from 762 the year before an increase of 30%. Santa Monica Boulevard alone accounted for 251 of those crashes and 90 injuries. Fountain Avenue had 109 total collisions and 51 injuries, second only to Santa Monica Boulevard’s 251. Fatal collisions doubled, from two to four. Pedestrian strikes jumped from 54 to 82. Hit-and-runs climbed to 211. DUI-related crashes were up 76%. The top spot for crashes was the intersection of Santa Monica Blvd. and La Brea Ave. with 11.
The Public Got There First
Three WeHo residents stepped up for public comment and all three came ready with data. Helen Krieger, who serves on the Transportation and Mobility Commission (and is also running for city council) flagged something that jumps out at you when you read the report: yes, speeding citations were up nearly 400%, which is great, it means enforcement is actually working, but accidents also went up. Krieger said she understood enforcement alone wasn’t going to solve the problem. “When you have a 400% increase in speeding citations and still have increased risk of collision, we need to start looking at some other things. Like safe street designs.”
Andrew Solomon, who also sits on the West Hollywood Planning Commission, pointed out DUI-related crashes jumped 76% with DUI arrests climbing 44%. He was advocating for ideas that in his view were more practical, more immediate. Long-term capital projects take years, the Fountain Avenue redesign has shown us that. So what can actually happen in the next few months that makes the numbers better next year?
Public Safety Commissioner Kelly Pilarski showed up wearing a shirt that read “Jones is not a drive through.” That’s a reference to the incident where a speeding driver plowed into the iconic restaurant at Santa Monica and Formosa, leaving 40 employees out of work and the dining room at half capacity. She held up page 24 of the sheriff’s report and said it was covered in red. Fatalities up 100%. More than 50% more likely to get hit crossing the street. Hit-and-run involvement up 15%. She had a specific ask: commit to reducing collisions at the 10 high-incident intersections already identified in the report. Start there.
What Councilmembers Found Missing
Councilmember Chelsea Byers came in with questions about the traffic division’s structure, and the answers she got seeked to underscored a bigger problem. She walked through it with Captain Fanny Lapkin. Traffic deputies focused on citations, two traffic detectives who handle collision investigations and present cases to the DA, five traffic enforcement vehicles staffed per shift. The new CSO (community safety officers) coming online will be able to help with collision reporting, but they can’t write citations. Lapkin confirmed that those require sworn personnel. Byers said she wants the structure looked at. What seemed to concern her more was the report had nothing dedicated to how law enforcement handles street safety. “There’s not one aspect of our law enforcement response that handles street safety specifically,” she said. Vision Zero lives in a separate report that never connects to this one. Parking enforcement’s newer authority to cite cars within 20 feet of stop signs doesn’t show up here either, even though Byers said that policy has already made streets meaningfully safer. None of it connects. She’s been pushing for a joint meeting between the Public Safety Commission and the Transportation Commission for a while now. She says these two worlds are colliding and the City needs somewhere to work through it.
Erickson says he’s done waiting for studies.
Councilmember John Erickson said he sits at Gardner and Santa Monica Boulevard on his way to get coffee and said he’s watched near-misses happen there repeatedly with sheriff’s deputies driving by. The right-on-red restrictions have been on the books for three or four years. He didn’t see a citation for it anywhere in this report. “No one’s following those rules… We have to [have] bold systemic change to our streets.” He said he’s done waiting for a block-by-block study before pushing for temporary barricades along Santa Monica Boulevard’s green bike lanes, the ones he and others say they can barely see. “City staff will tell me no,” he said, “but I’m not going to take it for an answer anymore.” He said if I they’re actually serious about protecting people, they need to make immediate changes. Telling his colleagues they can look forward to that in the coming days.
Councilmember Lauren Meister closed with a straightforward data request. Santa Monica Boulevard led the city in total and injury collisions. Two of the four fatalities last year happened on streets that wouldn’t typically show up on a high-risk list. She asked sheriff’s officials to get specific about locations in future reports so public works actually has something to act on. They agreed.
No votes, no directives. Informational only. But a pedestrian getting hit just hours later was a sign and not a good one.
The streets are not what’s causing excessive speeding, drink driving, showboating and general irresponsible driving. Every one of these so-called advocate “solutions” are about re-doing and re-configuring the streets somehow. About blaming someone else rather than the actual perpetrators. Never about enforcement. Having police and sheriff cars out on the streets waiting and nabbing the bastards would really knock the problem down. Getting the crazies off the streets instead of letting them wander and walk about into traffic like they own the streets would cut down on pedestrian incidents. I cant help but see an opportunity for these advocates to… Read more »