LA police arrest street safety activist for painting DIY crosswalk in Westwood

Los Angeles police arrested and cited a street safety activist on Sunday as he painted DIY crosswalks in Westwood with community members.

“I was like, ‘Hey, look, we don't have a permit. We're protesting for safer streets and a more effective government,’” Jonathan Hale said about his interaction with officers. “They were not down with that.”

Hale made headlines earlier this year when he led efforts to paint crosswalks around Stoner Park and at a Koreatown intersection where an RV driver hit and killed 9-year-old Nadir Gavarrete in July.

Hale and volunteers with a group he founded called People’s Vision Zero initially planned to work at the intersection of Wilkins and Midvale avenues. State data show a car hit and injured a 35-year-old man at that intersection in November 2020. There were too many potholes, Hale said, making painting there “unfeasible.” Instead, the group focused on the corner immediately adjacent at Wilkins and Kelton avenues.

According to a Los Angeles Police Department spokesperson, “a vandalism radio call was generated” around 11 a.m. that described “approximately 7 suspects were painting what appeared to be a fake crosswalk pretending to be city workers.”

Hale said the group had painted two of four total crosswalks and were working on the third when officers approached, asked him for a permit and eventually cited him for misdemeanor vandalism.

Hale said he made it clear to the officer questioning him, as well as in flyers and posters he distributed locally earlier in the week, that People’s Vision Zero is an “unofficial group painting an unpermitted crosswalk.”

“ I make it very clear I’m not a city employee,” Hale said.

People's Vision Zero painted two of four crosswalks at the corner before police showed up.

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Jonathan Hale

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A video from People’s Vision Zero shows an officer speaking to Hale and people watching him get arrested.

“You’re vandalizing city property without a permit,” the officer says in the video. “So I’m gonna ask y’all nicely — y’all can record all you want — but back up or I will take everyone to jail.”

Hale said he is due in court on Jan. 5.

In addition to the local outreach before painting the crosswalk, Hale submitted a 311 ticket on Oct. 7 requesting the city install a marked crosswalk at the Midvale intersection and emailed the mayor’s office about People’s Vision Zero’s planned action on Dec. 1.

Local councilmember responds

Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky represents the Westwood area.

In a statement, her spokesperson, Leo Daube, pointed to how DIY crosswalks present liability concerns for the city and need to be reviewed for "ADA access, visibility, and safety."

Daube added that Yaroslavsky recognizes the need for expedited delivery of safety improvements to L.A. streets and could see "volunteers supporting this work in a safe and legal way in the future."

While not involved with the incident, Daube said the office would "prefer enforcement focused on dangerous driving and speeding, which put residents at risk every day.”

Hale has been transparent with the mayor’s office

Hale met with the mayor’s office in September and said they discussed policy proposals that would address the city’s slow pace toward making streets in L.A. safer, the central frustration behind community-led campaigns like People’s Vision Zero.

According to correspondence shared with LAist, the mayor’s office has only responded once to Hale’s emails since the September meeting.

“While we share your goals, all roadway markings, including crosswalks, must comply with local, state, and federal standards to ensure consistency and minimize risk,” an Oct. 10 email from the mayor’s office states. “Though we can’t approve of or endorse unsanctioned roadway alterations, we welcome collaboration to advance safety initiatives.”

Nothing has materialized so far, Hale said, so his group has continued to paint crosswalks at certain intersections where pedestrians have been hit by vehicles. Hale emails the mayor’s office before each “paint party,” the term People’s Vision Zero uses to describe DIY crosswalk painting events, according to messages reviewed by LAist.

In the Dec. 1 email he sent about the Westwood crosswalk, Hale said People’s Vision Zero would stop painting crosswalks if the mayor’s office either “publicly and unequivocally condemns our actions” or “demonstrates urgency in ending traffic violence by taking tangible steps to make our streets safer.”

In a statement to LAist about Hale’s arrest, the mayor’s office said that “despite communication about City, State, and Federal laws and parameters, Jonathan has chosen to continue to pursue his own course of action.”

Where is the city’s Vision Zero program?

In the spring, an audit covering the first seven years of L.A.’s Vision Zero program found that a lack of political will and poor coordination hampered the city’s failed goal of reaching zero traffic deaths by 2025.

Since then, local leaders have been considering a suite of recommendations to revamp the program.

Last week, members of L.A. City Council’s budget committee largely approved the recommendations, but also criticized the city’s slow pace of implementing programs, such as speed safety cameras, that have proven to be effective in addressing traffic violence.

“I'm just sort of speaking for myself, but like almost every week someone's hit by a car and killed, it feels like, in our district,” Yaroslavsky said at the Dec. 2 meeting.

In a presentation to the committee, staff from the City Administrative Office and L.A.’s Department of Transportation said pedestrian fatalities in the city have increased nearly 36% since 2021, but that there’s been a decrease in vehicle-and-vehicle crashes.

“It is essentially getting safer to drive in L.A., and similar story across the country, but it is getting less safe to be a pedestrian,” Chris Rider, a city transportation engineer, said during the meeting.