Gail Shelley and her husband Mark have been asking the mayor of Auburn and the Public Works Department to do something to help at their intersection for the last two years.
They live at 301 Damage Drive, a four-way stop where Gamage Avenue crosses Park Avenue.
On Tuesday, Jan. 8, the Shelleys' were stunned when a car slammed into their home. One of the four nest cameras captured the crash.
The woman driving the car is from Georgia and told the Shelleys' she isn't used to driving in the snow. The driver said she did not see the stop sign in time to stop.
The driver is okay.
Police came to the Shelleys' home, and as they have in the past, asked to see the video. Their porch and some of the siding is damaged.
Mark Shelley says "she hit the breaks, started to slide, came directly across curb and ended up here." (the porch)
The Shelleys' were shocked but not surprised.
Little did the couple know when they installed the security cameras, after their cars had been broken into, that they would capture all that they have.
Out of the hundreds of videos, they have captured car accidents, robberies, overdoses and many people flying through the four way stop signs.
Gail Shelley says "we've seen a lot of people blowing through stop signs, we've caught a few car accidents. It's crazy and it seems to be getting a lot worse."
Gail has even taken to Facebook to post more than 100 videos of the traffic violations she continues to see. "If you go to my Facebook page you will see me literally begging for this to be fixed."
For the past two years, the couple say they have asked the mayor of Auburn, Jason Levesque, and the Public Works Dept. to add a stop light or at least a blinking stop sign to the intersection that has seen several car accidents.
At the end of last summer, Public Works reconfigured the intersection, adding sidewalks and repaving the road. The Shelleys' say they also rounded the corners, making the stop signs less visible.
Peter Crichton is Auburn's City Manager. He says "I've talked with the police chief to see how it compares to other intersections and again we have 900 intersections in the city of Auburn and it's not one the worse we have."
Crichton says they have given the intersection extra attention including increasing police patrols in the area.
Referring to police data, Crichton says in 2016 police officers gave out three verbal warnings, one citation and they had two crashes. In 2017 officers gave out nine verbal warnings, one summons and had four crashes. And in 2018 officers gave 31 verbal warnings, three summons and there were no crashes.
Crichton says the city will add flags to the existing stop signs, but ultimately he says there is only so much government can and should do. "People have to take a certain amount of responsibility and accountability for their own actions and what they do."
The Shelleys say they love their home and where they live but they are thinking of moving. Gail says the last thing she wants to see on her home security cameras is someone dying.
Mark Shelley says "something needs to change and quickly or someone is going to die".