By Police1 Staff
ROOSEVELT, Utah — Residents of a Utah city are up in arms after a city official’s run-in with the law spurred the removal of stop signs from a busy intersection.
KSL.com reported residents — concerned over safety issues stemming from the removal of the stop signs — contacted the city for an explanation. They discovered the road signs were taken down after a traffic stop involving a city manager.
On March 17, a highway patrol officer pulled over City Manager Ryan Snow after he rolled through a stop sign. After receiving the ticket, Snow talked to the city’s public works to investigate why there were three intersections in a row with 4-way stops, Mayor Vaun Ryan said in a statement to the news site.
“No one ever ordered or directed the Public Works director to remove the signs, but only to investigate it,” Ryan said.
The same week, signs were removed and a city attorney asked for Snow’s ticket to be dismissed “in the interest of justice.” The ticket was dismissed on April 6 pursuant to the city’s motion.
Residents were not happy.
“I’m very concerned because I see kids walking to and from school,” resident Brianna Broyles told KSL. “Parents with little kids walk along here. I hear tires screeching and horns honking.”
A group calling themselves the “Concerned Citizens of Roosevelt” posted the dash cam video of the stop on Facebook and are calling for the city to put the stop signs back up.
Snow told KSL he did not ask for any special favors in a statement via Facebook.
“Now that I have seen the video I was clearly wrong, and the officer had every right to ticket me. I am sorry for my error,” he wrote.
However, emails obtained by KVAL show Snow emailed Chief Rick Harrison to ask whether the department assigned officers to monitor intersections for “the chance that someone may not come to a complete stop.”
“Is this a rampant problem or are we seeing a ride just lately with the downturn in the economy?” Snow wrote. “If we focus on certain infractions does it help to reduce our overall crime rate?”
Harrison told the news site, after speaking with Snow, he saw no objections or ulterior motives to his inquiry.
Roosevelt City Manager by Marcie Cancio