FORT FRANCES—After agreeing to consider the issue in the 2007 budget process, town council spent a good deal of time talking about crossing guards at Monday’s budget meeting—and the discussion isn’t over.
Back in November, local resident Leslie Danielson—backed up by a petition signed by more than 600 people—requested the town hire a crossing guard to monitor at least one crosswalk in Fort Frances, specifically the one at King’s Highway and Keating Avenue.
After much discussion, council agreed Monday to refer the matter to the Planning and Development executive committee to gather more data regarding the need for crossing guards, with the aim to possibly hire one in the fall.
“This is a very important aspect of risk assessment in the town, this whole aspect of crossing guards,” said Fort Frances CAO Mark McCaig. “There’s pros and cons on all sides of it.
“This conversation is going to continue further,” he added. “It’s not an absolute that this is happening, but [council] feels it’s a compelling enough issue that they’ll hammer away at it for a while.
“The financial parts of it aren’t the big thing,” McCaig continued. “They’re looking at it and saying, ‘If you don’t go full out, are you putting yourself in a position of liability because you did it here and you didn’t do it here? Where do you go with this thing?’
“It’s a real double-edged sword,” he stressed. “If we really get into it, and we’re accepting full responsibility, and we don’t do a good job of it, have we exposed ourselves more?”
Planning and Development superintendent Rick Hallam noted the difficulty in the town hiring crossing guards is determining where to have them, adding “every mother wants their kids to be safe.”
Coun. John Albanese said the Rainy River Valley Safety Coalition did a survey and identified King’s Highway/Keating Avenue and Scott Street/Crowe Avenue as the most dangerous crossings here.
But Hallam noted the numbers he got from pedestrian traffic at Scott and Crowe indicated only 15-24 children cross there each day—“a pretty low number.”
Coun. Tannis Drysdale said the town should contact the two school boards to find out where they feel crossing guards are most needed.
Coun. Rick Wiedenhoeft noted he investigated the crossing guard issue previously and found the school boards didn’t give him the child traffic flow pattern information he wanted.
Coun. Andrew Hallikas said he felt council should get some data before making any decisions, adding maybe the matter shouldn’t be decided in this year’s budget.
“People have to realize we can’t have crossing guards at every intersection,” said Coun. Sharon Tibbs, who admitted she does have concerns about children and traffic near J.W. Walker School, where she works.
“How far should we go? I don’t think we should be in the business,” noted Coun. Paul Ryan.
Coun. Wiedenhoeft said he even has concerns about the safety of a crossing guard working at King’s Highway and Keating Avenue.
Operations and Facilities manager Doug Brown said he felt education was key, and that children should be taught how to safely cross the street on their own—whether it’s by their parents or by police officers visiting schools and promoting safety.
While the town initially had included $45,000 for crossing guards in the first draft of budget, it decided Monday to reduce that amount to $15,000.
This was due to the likelihood the town wouldn’t hire any crossing guards until September and thus any one they would hire only would be working one-third of the year.
< *c>Underpass work
Also at Monday’s meeting on the 2007 budget, town council passed a bylaw to apply for 100 percent funding of the $2.1-million underpass project under the provincial Rural Infrastructure Investment Initiative.
The tender for the project will be awarded this coming Monday (Jan. 22), with the aim to get work started in the spring.
But whether the town has to pay for it out of its own funds, or whether it can be done entirely through outside sources, remains the question.
Brown said the town does have money in place that will be used for the underpass project if it does not get the $2.1 million it’s asking for.
This money includes $883,000 in “Ontario Move” funding and $540,000 in federal gas tax revenues.
But if the town does get the full 100 percent from the province, this other money certainly would be used for other purposes, such as waste management, noted Brown.
In the case the town gets no funding or not enough, the town probably would have to use existing reserves (or borrowing for long-term debt) to fund the remainder of the project.
< *c>RRFDC proposal
As a follow-up to a presentation made by the Rainy River Future Development Corp. at its Jan. 8 meeting, town council agreed Monday to include the RRFDC into its budget at an amount of $55,000 ($7 per capita), plus $50,000 in extra funding to be used for projects.
Mayor Roy Avis said he felt the RRFDC was the best choice for economic development service, and was impressed by its presentation offering enhanced services for the next three years for the same per capita cost.
Coun. Sharon Tibbs noted the town has tried different approaches to economic development in the past (such as having the mayor be an economic development officer), but experience has shown that working with the RRFDC “seems to have worked best.”
The next budget meeting is slated for Monday, Jan. 29.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
