Teen's Death Spurs Queens Corner Rally For Laws On Aging Drivers

WHITESTONE, QUEENS -- The 17-year-old Flushing girl who was hit and killed by an 88-year-old driver at a Whitestone intersection could have been your child, your sibling, your best friend - It could have been you.

Protesters hammered that point home Monday evening as they packed the corner of Utopia Parkway and 16th Avenue where Maddie Sershen was killed on June 25 by an elderly driver who ran a red light. Armed with bright yellow T-shirts and homemade signs, her family, politicians and complete strangers gathered to demand changes - mainly stricter license requirements for senior drivers - to prevent more lives from being lost.

"Yellow was Maddie's color, and yellow represents hope," Rita Barravecchio, one of Sershen's aunts who organized the protest, told Patch. "We have all the hope that change will happen."

Sershen's family is calling on the state's Department of Motor Vehicles to mandate more periodic driver's license testing for motorists as they get older. They've since partnered with local lawmakers to push the cause.

Bayside Sen. Tony Avella announced at the rally he will meet with the American Automobile Association (AAA) and the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) to discuss their cause in the coming weeks.

"This should never happen again," Avella said. "It shouldn't have happened in the first place, but the one thing we can do to honor her memory is make sure it never happens again."

But for some families at the protest, the heartbreak of losing a child to reckless driving is all too familiar.

Amy Tam-Lio and Hsi-Pei Lio helped launch Transportation Alternatives' "Families For Safe Streets" group, but the Flushing pair may not have been at the rally if not for the October 2013 death of their three-year-old daughter, Allison, who was hit and killed while crossing a Main Street intersection hand-in-hand with her grandmother by a driver who didn't see them.

"We weren't really advocates for safer streets before, but we found out how many people are killed that way and it's ridiculous," Tam-Lio told Patch. "Since then we've been fighting for safer streets."

Rauel Ampuero feels their pain, though his wounds are still fresh. The Fresh Meadows father is still mourning the death of his nine-year-old boy, Giovanni, who was killed by an 86-year-old driver in April at the Jackson Heights intersection of 70th Street and Northern Boulevard.

"How many more kids to we have to lose?" Ampuero asked a growing crowd of protesters. "I go to every rally that I can, but I'm tired, I'm tired, I'm tired."

"We lost a beautiful person, 17 years old. She had a future, for God's sake."

The mourning father called out state politicians both for not putting more restrictions on senior drivers and for allowing hundreds of the city's school zone speed cameras to go dark when they failing to renew the now-expired legislation that funded them.

"I'm mad at the politicians, and I don't want to be political," Ampuero said. "It's just common sense, saving kids. It doesn't matter where you come from, where you live, it's about family."

Such calls for change at the protest build on a Change.org petition launched after Sershen's death that calls on the DMV to mandate some sort of drivers license retesting for motorists after they turn 80. It quickly went viral, garnering more than 21,000 signatures.

The petition's founder, Julien Ho, said he never met Sershen or her family before the crash but felt called to do something when his wife, Rachel Graham, stumbled upon the crash while taking their son to the park.

"I cross this road with my son every day at that time," Graham told Patch at the rally.

"It could have been us, it could have been any child at this school. That's why we're really pushing for laws that will keep this from happening again."

Barravecchio echoed that message during her final statement at the rally.

"We are not going to stop until a change is here," she said. "So, DMV, you better watch out."

Sershen's family may not have that peace of mind yet, but they learned Monday that they will soon have a symbolic gesture to remind them and the community of their cause.

Speaking at the rally, City Councilman Paul Vallone announced the Department of Transportation agreed to rename the corner of Utopia Parkway and 16th Avenue "Maddie's Way." The entire block outside P.S. Q209 will be redone to encourage drivers to slow down, he said.

Lauren Rachbauer, a lifelong family friend who grew up with Sershen, told Patch the surprise gesture moved her to tears.

"This was always going to be her corner, but this is just a sign that this was important to so many people outside of just her family," Rachbauer said.

"Maddie was a vibrant young girl with so much life in her. She deserved a chance."

Lead photos by Danielle Woodward/Patch