Gilroy – School and city officials opted not to seek coveted
federal safety funds this year, despite ongoing concerns about
kids’ safety in Gilroy crosswalks.
Gilroy – School and city officials opted not to seek coveted federal safety funds this year, despite ongoing concerns about kids’ safety in Gilroy crosswalks.
“Es una batalla,” said Arnaldo Gaeta, describing his daily walk to Glen View Elementary School with his grandson: It’s a battle.
To increase child safety, the Safe Routes to School (SRTS) federal grant shells out cash for street improvements such as revamped crosswalks, sidewalks and signage and for educational programs that tame school-zone traffic. California schools hope to net $45 million of $612 million in nationwide funds this year, competing with schools across the country. But Gilroy schools won’t be in the running: School officials say they didn’t have the time or the cash to apply for the grant money.
“The engineering and community groundwork required for application is very extensive,” said public information officer and grant writer Teri Freedman, “more than could be accomplished between Nov. 1 and the Jan. 2 due date.”
This year, SRTS’ requests for proposals came out in October. One month after Gilroy Unified School District Superintendent Edwin Diaz mentioned possibly applying for the grant in his winter bulletin, school officials decided to drop the idea, put off by expensive engineering assessments and looming deadlines. This is the first time the school district has considered applying for the funds, said Freedman, who estimated that engineering conducted by outside firms would cost $5,000 per school.
The assessments are not required to receive grant money, but could give Gilroy a leg up on the competition.
“You’re competing with every other city in the state, and the funds are scarce,” said city traffic engineer Don Dey, who consulted school officials on a possible application. “Last year, they awarded about one grant per county.”
But other cities have snagged funding without costly assessments, said Wendi Kallins, program director of the Transportation Authority of Marin, which administers Marin County’s SRTS program. Marin County laid the groundwork for the nationwide program, cutting their own school-zone congestion by 13 percent, Kallins said. Among the county’s most successful programs are “non-engineering” efforts such as Walk to School days and crosswalk safety education.
Many cities skew their applications toward infrastructure improvements because that’s where the money is: Seventy percent of SRTS funds go toward concrete improvements such as curbs and crosswalks, and 30 percent support educational programs or traffic enforcement.
As Gilroy shifts to neighborhood schooling, which sends kids to schools close to home, GUSD attendance director Juanita Contin said she hopes to see more kids walking or biking to school, instead of piling into the car. But after two 5-year-old boys died crossing Gilroy streets last year, some parents are spooked. That means more parents driving kids, more cars swarming around schools, and more near-misses for crossing guard Arnold Cessna, who is sick and tired of dodging cars as he guides kids from corner to corner.
“They’re waiting for an accident to happen here,” said Cessna, who patrols the intersection of Eighth and Princevalle streets near Glen View school, “and that’s when they’ll finally do something about it.”
If Cessna had SRTS funds, he said, he’d put up newer, bigger signs, cut down the speed limit to 20 miles per hour, and paint the curbs red alongside the intersection, to make sure he can see oncoming cars.
“It gets like Highway 880 out here,” he said, “bumper-to-bumper! I have to run out of the crosswalk, just to make sure I don’t get hit!”
Before dropping this year’s application, school officials bounced a few ideas back and forth with engineer Dey. City officials hoped SRTS funds could smooth Gilroy’s cracked sidewalks, or at least those bordering schools; Freedman, Contin and transportation supervisor Darren Salo wanted to revise the district’s recommended walking routes, now outdated by the shift to neighborhood schooling.
“If some children followed those routes,” said Dey, “they might wind up at the wrong school!”
As they picked up students from Glen View School Tuesday afternoon, some Gilroy parents said they’d like to see money spent on educating school-zone drivers. In Marin County, schools have purchased one such program, called StreetSmarts, from the city of San Jose.
“You know the phrase, ‘We’ve met the enemy and it is us?’ ” asked Kallins. “It really is that way. We’re soon to launch a whole campaign to raise awareness and consciousness of parents driving kids to school.”
With some more research, and community input, the school district should be poised to apply for funds next year, said Freedman.
But crossing guard Cessna says he’s reaching his limit with close calls in the crosswalks, and no new solutions are forthcoming from the city or schools.
“Something’s got to be done,” he said. “It’s been two years I’ve been complaining about it, but no one wants to hear it.”
