COLUMBUS, Ohio — Every day started the same at A Better Choice Daycare and Learning Center.
Smiles and loads of laughter, especially from 4-year-old Catherine Rodriguez.
"Her smile was magnetic I just remember her running in here and running out,” said Kelly Spence.
Since she was an infant, Spence and Anita Roman have cared for Catherine at the daycare.
That all changed after Monday night.
"One of the openings that I do in the morning is 'OK children, let’s look around who's absent today,' and they all say, 'Catherine. Where's Catherine,'” said Roman. “I said 'she...was hurt by a car...' and I leave it like that, so they'll think 'oh, she'll be here tomorrow...' and there's not going to be a tomorrow.”
That’s the hardest question they’ve had to answer.
Catherine was dressed as an Incredible character for Halloween. She went trick-or-treating with an adult. Just before 7 p.m. that day, she and an adult were hit by a vehicle while walking in a crosswalk.
Catherine died at the hospital that night.
"It's not going to be the same… it’s never going to be the same,” said Roman, trying to hold back tears.
Spence said justice for them is change. Change Columbus City Councilwoman Lourdes Barrosa de Padilla is working on.
She said city leaders are working on Vision Zero, a strategy that helps educate people about the rules of the road and find better ways to make streets safer.
"We can install tools; we can put those things up but if people don't follow those guidelines even going 5 miles over the is the difference whether someone lives or dies,” Barrosa de Padilla said.
Spence and Roman hope no one else will ever have to live through this pain.
"I strongly believe that…had a stop light been there Catherine would've been with us today we wouldn't even be sitting here,” said Spence.
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