When a city refuses to take action, sometimes its citizens take it upon themselves. While there are plenty of mayors not worth their weight in gold, one hero in California decided to take action when he felt his mayor didn’t. Instead of letting a crosswalk continue being a hazard, he painted the crosswalk for the sake of safety. But given that the mayor “opposed” his actions, the man was cited and arrested soon after giving a crosswalk a new makeover.
Shared by People’s Vision Zero on Instagram, and confirmed by the activist himself on Reddit, “Jonnyshottit” was recorded being handcuffed by the LAPD. Jonny has been fighting for safer crosswalks in Los Angeles. He said back in September, he had a meeting with the mayor to talk with them about making the streets safer. This was spurred by the death of 9-year-old Nadir Gavarrete, and injuring his older brother in August 2025. According to Jonny, “The mayor’s office made it clear they opposed our actions and doubled down on defending the status quo.”
Jonny took matters into his own hands, painting sidewalks in according to California’s code. He’ll even notify the right people ahead of time. They especially do this in areas with higher injuries and lives lost (that could’ve been prevented with a safe crosswalk). Jonny spread the word, even through fliers, that he was going to paint it anyway.
Unfortunately, after a recent painting, police showed up. In the video, you can see the officer patting down Jonny. He then says, “You’re vandalizing city property without a permit. So Imma ask ya’ll nicely” to “back up” or else he would arrest everybody. Jonny says in a follow-up he was arrested for not complying. Since he didn’t back down, he was given a citation.
“Yeah, but if you do it for free, then the city council members can’t pay their nephew’s construction company $20,000 to paint a crosswalk!!!! Think about that poor Nepo construction company owner! You’re taking food out of his mouth!” one person mocked.
Another person added, “You can’t do that for free. That’s how the politicians embezzle infrastructure money.”
Jonny has since been released and announced in a post on Reddit he’ll be presenting a report sometime next week. More importantly, he reminded everyone, “This city was not built by people who looked at the way things are and said “this is good enough”.”
