Missing toddler was found by bus driver

Tami Workman remembers 18 years ago when her then-2-year-old daughter let herself out of their apartment at 3 a.m.

The incident ended safely with the return of her daughter, but the feeling of dread was never forgotten.

As Workman was driving a Palace Transit bus last week in Mitchell, the memory of that maternal panic came rushing back as a call came over the radio telling all drivers in the public transportation system to look for a missing 3-year-old boy.

“I knew what that mom was feeling,” Workman said. “I’m sure she was scared to death.”

As drivers, police officers and residents combed an area of South Lawler Street looking for the boy March 22, Workman saw a “flash of blue” that turned out to be the missing toddler. He was wearing footed pajamas, carrying a plastic gun and flashing a wide smile, and he hopped on Workman’s bus as soon as she opened the door.

“I said, ‘Everybody’s been looking for you,’ ” she recalled. “He said, ‘I’m here. Where’s Mom?’ ”

The boy stood beside Workman in the bus and chatted until a public safety officer came to return him to his home.

The emotional state of the driver and the boy couldn’t have been more different.

“I got all nervous right away. My hands were shaking,” Workman said. “He wasn’t scared at all. He was proud running around in his little jammies.”

Workman said she’s happy a lost boy and his frightened mother were reunited so quickly.

“If it had been me and it was my child, it would have been reassuring to know the public just jumps right in and looks for them right away,” Workman said.

“I was just the lucky one that saw him first.”

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