Clark County School District Police officer Keith Habig wears a heart costume as he crosses Russell Road with resident Zsanique Bryant during a Valentines in a Crosswalk pedestrian safety event at Russell and Topaz Street Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2024.
Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024 | 2 a.m.
As vehicles raced on Russell Road for their commute Tuesday morning, they were met with an obstacle: a big, red heart pacing through the crosswalk, forcing them to lurch to a halt.
“At 45 miles an hour, it’s not going to be a bruise,” said Keith Habig, Clark County School District Police officer. Habig is the big, red heart, adorned in a bright costume designed to bring awareness to pedestrian safety.
Habig, along with officers from other Southern Nevada departments, gathered at the intersection of Russell Road and Euclid Street next to Helen Cannon Middle School for the second Valentine in the Crosswalk event.
The gathering was organized by the Road Equity Alliance Project to highlight the increase in pedestrian fatalities compared with last year. Thirty-eight people have died in vehicular incidents in Nevada in 2024, according to Zero Fatalities Nevada, an organization sponsored by the Nevada Department of Public Safety. Of the 38, 20 were pedestrians.
By comparison, there were 27 fatalities in January 2023 and a total of 385 fatalities in all of 2023, the group said.
“We live in a city built for vehicles with few places for those not traveling by car to be safe, especially if you need to cross the street,” said Erin Breen, director of the Road Equity Alliance Project in a news release.
As Habig marches from one side of the road to another, he watches for oncoming cars speeding toward the crosswalk. Though most stop, some simply tap the brakes while others speed right through.
Habig signals to the other officers, who promptly pull over the offenders. A few times, cars stop only a few feet from the costumed officer.
The demonstration was purposely organized next to the middle school to underline how dangerous speeding cars can be for children on their commute to and from school. Although there have been no child pedestrian fatalities during the 2023-24 school year in Clark County, there have been at least 70 injuries involving child pedestrians hit by vehicles, a 38% increase from last school year, officials said.
Among the injuries was an 11-year-old who was run over by a pickup truck in southwest Las Vegas in January. And in late 2023, a resident in the neighborhood near Tuesday’s event said a 12-year-old was struck in the same crosswalk Habig would be using.
Officials plan to be aggressive in their approach to a solution. The Clark County Commission on Feb. 20 will consider an agenda item to provide funding for crossing guards for middle schools throughout the Clark County School District. Crossing guards are only at elementary schools.
The agenda item would change Clark County’s estimated spending on crossing guards from $2.2 million to a little over $4 million, which would go to employing crossing guards at middle schools and raising the wages of all crossing guards in July.
Additionally, the 2023 Nevada Legislature passed “Rex’s Law,” which enhanced the criminal penalty for reckless driving convictions that occur in school crossings or pedestrian safety zones. The law was named after Rex Patchett, a 13-year-old from Henderson who was struck by a speeding driver outside Mannion Middle School in 2022.
The CCSD Police Department received $374,000 in grants in 2023 from the Nevada Department of Public Safety to put toward road safety awareness and enforcement programs. One of those grants goes toward the Zero Teen Fatalities program, which allows Habig to go to classes and educate young drivers and pedestrians about responsible practices and road safety.
“I have a huge passion for it,” Habig said. “People just don’t pay attention on the roadways and we’re losing far too many people, which is senseless.”
Habig said the best way to make the roadways safer for both pedestrians and drivers was to follow all speed limits and wear brighter clothes when walking across the street to provide better visibility to drivers.
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