Your Street Is Not As Safe As You Think: What A New Grand Jury Report Reveals About Speeding In Bakersfield Neighborhoods

A new report from the Kern County Grand Jury confirms what many Bakersfield families may already know: the residential streets where children play, neighbors walk dogs, and families back out of driveways every morning are not being protected the way they should be.

The report, titled “Traffic Calming for the City of Bakersfield: We Should All Slow Down,” paints a sobering picture of a city that has grown dramatically while its traffic safety infrastructure has struggled to keep pace. For anyone who has watched a driver blow through a stop sign on a quiet neighborhood street, or heard tires screech somewhere nearby and held their breath, the findings will feel familiar.

“This report puts data behind what our clients have been telling us for years,” said Matt Clark, managing partner and attorney for the Law Office of Chain | Cohn | Clark. “Bakersfield’s neighborhoods are not adequately protected from speeding drivers, and when someone gets hurt because of that failure, it falls on real families to pick up the pieces.”

Between 2000 and 2025, Bakersfield’s population grew by more than 71%, from roughly 245,000 residents to over 420,000, according to the report. The city’s land area also expanded. Streets that once carried light residential traffic, places like Gosford Road, Columbus Street, and Coffee Road, have been transformed into six-lane arterials moving thousands of vehicles a day.

But here is the part that should concern every Bakersfield resident: In the year 2000, Bakersfield’s Traffic Engineering Support Division had approximately five engineers. In 2026, that number remains essentially the same.

The Grand Jury found that this staffing freeze, sustained over more than a quarter century, has forced the division into a reactive posture. Rather than proactively monitoring neighborhoods and identifying dangerous conditions before someone gets hurt, engineers respond primarily to citizen complaints. And filing one of those complaints is not simple.

According to the report, residents who want to raise a speeding concern in their neighborhood are typically directed to contact the Bakersfield Police Department by email. If BPD decides the concern warrants attention, officers may be dispatched to monitor the area for a period of time. But that deterrence disappears the moment the patrol car leaves.

If a resident wants to pursue an engineering solution, such as a speed hump or a formal traffic study, they must circulate a petition among their neighbors, collecting signatures from more than 50% of affected households, before the city will even initiate a full review. The Grand Jury noted that it is not entirely clear how the city defines which households qualify as “affected.”

That petition form, the report notes, is buried at the end of the Neighborhood Traffic Calming Program document. It is not easily found on the City of Bakersfield’s website, and there is no online portal where a concerned resident can simply submit a traffic safety concern the way they might report a pothole.

“What this Grand Jury report tells us is that the City has made it very hard for residents to actually put the city on notice,” Clark said. “That is a serious problem.”

Speed Humps Are Helping, But Slowly

One concrete step the City has taken is the installation of speed humps in select residential and school zones. The Grand Jury was careful to distinguish speed humps from the speed bumps found in parking lots. Speed humps are designed to gradually reduce vehicle speeds to between 10 and 15 miles per hour, using a more gradual transition than a traditional bump. They are the preferred tool for residential streets precisely because they slow traffic without the abrupt jolt that can jar emergency vehicles or frustrate drivers into swerving.

Public Works has begun installing them in some areas, and the Grand Jury acknowledged the efforts of dedicated city staff who are working hard under difficult conditions. But the report also noted that placement must be carefully designed to avoid unintended consequences, including concerns from fire and emergency responders that humps could slow response times or damage equipment.

The broader problem is that speed humps, when deployed at all, are deployed reactively, after a complaint has been made and a petition has been signed and a review has been completed. By that time, depending on how long the process takes, someone may already have been seriously injured.

Among the more striking findings in the Grand Jury report is the absence of routine coordination between the Bakersfield Police Department and the Public Works Traffic Engineering Division. The two entities both play roles in traffic safety, BPD through enforcement and Public Works through engineering, but there is no regular meeting between them to share data, identify emerging problem areas, or align their approaches.

The Grand Jury found that a monthly list of speeding complaints is sent from Public Works to BPD, but that no formal meeting structure exists to ensure those concerns translate into action. The report recommends that the two departments establish formal annual or biannual meetings to close that gap.

This disconnect matters because engineering and enforcement are not substitutes for each other. A police presence can temporarily deter speeding on a given block. Only engineering solutions, better road design, traffic calming measures, and appropriate signage, can produce lasting change. When the two sides are not communicating regularly, problem streets can fall through the cracks.

What the Grand Jury Is Recommending

The 2025-2026 Grand Jury issued seven formal recommendations directed at the City of Bakersfield, the City Council, and the Public Works Department. They include:

• Implementing a routine citywide review of traffic patterns by July 1, 2026.
• Conducting a pay equity and workload study for Public Works staff.
• Partnering with California State University Bakersfield to bring engineering interns into the department.
• Establishing formal coordination meetings between Public Works and BPD.
• Consolidating the City’s overlapping and sometimes conflicting traffic plans.
• Adding an online complaint form so residents can easily report speeding concerns without having to track down a buried PDF.

The City of Bakersfield has since responded to the report, acknowledging several of the findings and indicating steps are being taken. But recommendations and responses are not the same as action, and families living on straight, unmarked residential streets that see traffic traveling 45 miles per hour do not have the luxury of waiting on a government timeline.

The Grand Jury report now provides documented evidence that the City of Bakersfield has been aware of systemic gaps in its residential traffic safety program. That kind of official acknowledgment can be significant in personal injury and wrongful death cases involving dangerous streets.

“A speeding driver is responsible for what they do behind the wheel. But when a city has been told, in writing, that it does not have the staff or systems to keep neighborhoods safe, and people keep getting hurt, that is a community failure that deserves a real answer,” Clark said.

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If you or someone you know is injured in an accident at the fault of someone else, or injured on the job no matter whose fault it is, contact the attorneys at Chain | Cohn | Clark by calling (661) 323-4000, or fill out a free consultation form, text, or chat with us at chainlaw.com.