TAMPA, Fla. — Janine Sarbak and her dog, Maggie, don’t live in Tampa, but they spend a lot of time there.
Sarbak’s son lives on Harbour Island, so she and her dog visit often and take frequent walks through the quaint community, which is just steps from downtown Tampa.
It’s a place the two enjoy. However, they and the many others who walk there have to be careful.
“My son had a friend that was hit by a car here while he was walking in the middle of the day,” Sarbak said.
She says the island’s intersections and crosswalks can be dangerous because some people speed through them while others ignore the stop signs entirely.
Kurt Thoreson, who lives on the island, concurs. He also walks his dog throughout the island and has had close calls with drivers ignoring traffic laws, along with a family member.
“My wife’s 80-year-old grandfather had to dodge a car when he had the right of way in the crosswalk with his dog. Nearly was hit. That was the tipping point for me.”
Since then, Thoreson has documented the problem by recording videos of drivers ignoring the stop signs. He also has Tampa Police Department (TPD) on speed dial.
Tuesday, he showed up at a community forum hosted by the department to yet again report the problem to officers.
“I don’t know if it’s a sense of entitlement being out here on Harbour Island. You’ve got college kids. You’ve got people with sports cars wanting to rev their engines,” he said.
The complaints seem to be working.
Wednesday afternoon, ABC Action News watched as a TPD officer in an unmarked patrol car pulled over multiple drivers for rolling through stop signs on Beneficial Drive. The officer said TPD has been conducting similar stops on Harbour Island for at least a month after receiving complaints.
Many of them likely came from Thoreson.
“I would just like to see people obey the law,” Thoreson said.
He hopes the enforcement will help, and so does Sarbak.
“I’m constantly watching the cars because they speed by, so I have to make sure [Maggie] doesn’t walk ahead of me because I’m afraid that something will happen to her,” she said.
Sarbak thinks someone could be seriously hurt or even killed here if the problem isn’t remedied.
