September 11, 2013 (Sacramento):  SCUSD and City of Sacramento officials announced on Wednesday that they have joined forces to install a traffic signal at a Fruitridge Road crossing where a West Campus High School student lost her life 20 months ago.

Michelle Murigi, 16, was hit by a car in the crosswalk at 58th Street at Fruitridge Road on January 19, 2012, and died from her injuries. Subsequent to her death, five of Michelle’s friends and classmates started a petition to demand a traffic signal at the intersection (www.facebook.com/58thAndFruitridge).

On Wednesday, SCUSD Superintendent Jonathan Raymond and Sacramento City Councilman Kevin McCarty announced that the school district and city have formed a partnership to fund and install the signal.

“We are here today to make sure what happened 20 months ago never again happens,” said Superintendent Raymond. He also congratulated West Campus students for continuing to press for safety improvements. “Leave it to our students to make sure issues like this never become silent.”

Mary Murigi, Michelle’s mother, said her daughter was crossing Fruitridge at dusk after tutoring students at Mark Twain Elementary School, which is adjacent to West Campus. Although Mary Murigi often picked up her daughter after school, on Thursdays Michelle walked home. “Thursday morning I had a child and by 5 that afternoon I did not,” she recalled of the day Michelle died.

Like Michelle’s friends, family members worked hard to lobby city officials for a signal, Mary Murigi said. If other families are spared the Murigi family’s tragedy, the hard work will be worth it, she added.