Late Sunday night, two Milwaukee women, May Daiber and Amy Austin, a woman who beat cancer twice, were simply crossing the street after enjoying a night of billiards near Teutonia and Vienna. They were doing what thousands of us do every week; walking to their cars, minding their business, living their lives.
A black SUV came barreling down the street at a terrifying speed, struck both women, killed them, and kept going. No brakes. No hesitation. No humanity.
This is just the latest incident of reckless driving in Milwaukee’s streets.
Milwaukee has been “reacting” to reckless driving for years, but reacting is not the same as solving. In 2024, the city launched its Vision Zero initiative, promising safer streets, slower speeds, and fewer deaths.
One of the most hideous pieces of that initiative was the $88,000 taxpayer‑funded “Moving City Forward” truck — a giant, awkward, cartoonish vehicle meant to “remind” drivers to slow down. Residents hated it. Alders questioned it. And now it has vanished. No one sees it anymore. No one knows where it is. And no one believes it ever made a difference.
That money could have funded real safety improvements.
The city also narrowed busy streets to one lane. It installed speed bumps and traffic‑calming devices in high crash areas. Reckless driving still continues to hurt and kill innocent people.
Some of these drivers are children, as young as 12, stealing cars and racing them for sport and entertainment. Others are distracted adults glued to their phones instead of watching the road. And then there are the chronic offenders, the ones who treat Milwaukee’s streets like a personal racetrack.
Milwaukee’s reckless driving crisis did not appear recently. It grew from a street‑racing culture spreading through social media, stolen car joyriding (the “Kia Boys” era), weak enforcement with little legal action, and limited consequences for repeat offenders.
Milwaukee residents, especially on the near North and South Sides, have been living with the consequences of reckless driving like fatalities, hit‑and‑runs, and dangerous intersections. Milwaukee’s Black residents pay the highest price. They are 2.1× more likely to be victims of fatal or severe crashes.
Wisconsin created a Driver Education Grant Program to help young people access driver’s education and then earn licenses.
Students who qualify for free or reduced lunch can have their driver’s education paid for. It is a good step, but it is not enough to counteract the culture of reckless driving that has taken root.
Milwaukee streets are full of families, workers, elders, kids walking or driving to school. These are people just trying to get home safely. Yet every single day, people are in fear of roaring engines, screeching tires, and the sickening thud of another crash.
Reckless driving is not just a city occurrence. It is a public safety emergency that has changed how we walk, move, or feel safe in our own communities.
The city must approve speed‑camera legislation, increase first‑offense fines, require mandatory license suspensions, and create felony penalties for chronic offenders.
May Daiber and Amy Austin should still be alive.
They should have made it to their cars.
They should have made it home.
Their deaths are not “accidents.”
They are the result of a system that has allowed reckless driving to flourish.
Milwaukee must demand more accountability, more enforcement, more engineering, more urgency.
Until real change happens, our streets will continue to claim lives, and families will continue to grieve losses that should never have happened.
