Alan Jay Mulder, BHS 1967

Worker killed while stopped on Reyes Adobe Road

By Sylvie Belmond, The Acorn Newspaper, June 2017

 

Alan Mulder, a 68-year-old landscape contractor and family patriarch, sustained fatal injuries Sat., June 10, 2017 when a passing car struck him while he was standing next to his work truck on Reyes Adobe Road in Agoura Hills.

 

Mulder was working on a landscaping job for the City of Agoura Hills along the north side of the road near Rainbow Crest when the accident occurred shortly before 1 p.m.

While his work truck and utility wagon were parked on the shoulder of the road, a car driven by a 74-year-old woman approached from behind.

 

“She apparently thought she had sufficient clearance to pass, but must have misjudged it so she hit the back of the utility trailer and sideswiped the vehicle until she reached the truck driver’s door where Mulder was standing and getting ready to enter his truck,” Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective David Huelsen said. Mulder was transported to Los Robles Hospital and Medical Center in Thousand Oaks where he died from his injuries.

 

The driver who hit Mulder stopped and cooperated with authorities. Her name was not released, and the cause of the accident is still under investigation, Huelsen said.

 

Mulder is survived by his wife, Margie, who is a retired teacher from the Las Virgenes Unified School District; two adult sons, Christopher and Michael, and their wives; and eight grandchildren.

He and his wife came to Agoura Hills more than 25 years ago.

 

TOGETHER— The Mulder family gathers for a photo during a 2016 vacation to Santa Cruz. Alan Mulder and his wife, Margie, are seated in front. Courtesy of Christopher Mulder.

“He was a faithful, dedicated, hard-working husband, father, grandfather, brother and son,” the Mulder family told The Acorn in a statement. He served as a deacon at Bethel Christian Reformed Church in Sun Valley.

Mulder grew up in Burbank and earned a history degree from UCLA. He later became a licensed landscape contractor and arborist, and founded Agoura Hills-based Savanna Landscape Inc., which has provided lawn care and landscaping services to commercial and residential clients in Ventura and Los Angeles counties for the past 30 years.

Memorial donations may be made to the two charities he supported: World Vision and The Salvation Army.