Committee Hearing, April 22, 2004

COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT and PUBLIC SAFETY - - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Thursday, April 22, 2004 1:20 p.m. - - - - RESOLUTION 040035 - Resolution authorizing City Council's Committee on Legislative Oversight and Committee on Public Safety to hold joint hearings to investigate the alarmingly high number of incidents in which our school children are struck by vehicles on their way to and from school. PRESENT: COUNCILMAN JAMES KENNEY, Chair COUNCILWOMAN DONNA REED MILLER, Chair COUNCILMAN DAVID COHEN COUNCILMAN MICHAEL NUTTER COUNCILMAN JAMES KENNEY COUNCILMAN W. WILSON GOODE, JR. COUNCILWOMAN JOAN KRAJEWSKI COUNCILMAN FRANK RIZZO COUNCILMAN BRIAN O'NEILL - - - - V A R A L L O Incorporated Litigation Support Services Eleven Penn Center 1835 Market Street, Suite 600 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103 215.561.2220 215.567.2670 2 I N D E X RESOLUTION 040035 BRIAN SIMPSON........................ TAMISHA JOHNSON...................... 8 6 HARVEY RICE, Phila. School District.. 20 PAT RAYMOND, Philadelphia Home and 7 School Council................... 27 JENNIFER TOOLE, Toole Design......... 45 8 WALTER BROWN, Paradise Valley School District.................. 65 LEIGH MATUSICK, Florida Dept. of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles. 83 CLARENA TOLSON, Commissioner, Philadelphia Streets Department.. 105 DEXTER GREEN, Chief Safety Executive, School District of Philadelphia.. 108 PHIL GOLDSMITH, Managing Director.... 113 EUGENE CUMMINGS, Philadelphia Police Department....................... 132 BETTY MCDONALD, Local 1956........... 134 ROXANNE GALEOTA...................... 141 SEAN MCALEER, Franklin Town Charter High School...................... 149 3 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is a joint Committee of the Legislative Oversight and Public Safety Committee. I'm Chair of the Oversight Committee, Councilman Kenney, and Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller chairs the Public Safety Committee. In attendance is Councilman W. Wilson Goode, Jr. Other Councilmembers are coming, but we would like, in the interest of people's time and schedule, to get started with our testimony. Before we get to our first witness, let me just state for the record that this issue is a very serious concern to the Members of Council relative to public safety. Also in attendance is Councilwoman Joan Krajewski. As I said earlier, this Council has some serious concerns, as does the Administration and parents and School District Administration officials, serious concerns, about the safety of our children coming and going to school, of pedestrian safety in 4 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 general and the issues related to the 70 children that have been hit so far by automobiles this year, in either coming to school or leaving school. We have assembled a list of witnesses today, some people who have come to us from the State of Florida, from Phoenix, Arizona and from Baltimore, Maryland, three areas, three jurisdictions and states that have a very good program that we would like to see how they have put that program together and see if we can emulate some of what they have done. Also, Managing Director Phil Goldsmith and Dexter Green from the School District will be testifying to talk a little bit about some of the efforts they've undertaken to put a task force together to look at the problem holistically and see if they can't come up with some recommendations. Our effort here is to try to work together as best we can to come up with a set of plans and recommendations that we can implement, hopefully, by September to get that 5 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 70 number down to, hopefully, zero, but to get it down significantly. Also, I'd like to take the opportunity to thank the Philadelphia Daily News and Marilyn Kim for her terrific work and investigation and writing about this issue because it's very, very important and it kind of brought it to our attention. And, therefore, we look forward to try to develop this hearing. The task force got started as a result of that coverage and we are very happy to kind of work together to solve this problem. Our children are our number one priority and their safety is extremely important to us. And I think generally we need to have a discussion about not only school safety and pedestrian safety coming and going to school, but kind of just the way we in this area in Philadelphia drive and treat pedestrians, bicyclists and the like. It's a very dangerous place out there. I notice in Center City and in other neighborhoods you'll see people blowing red 6 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 lights on a regular basis. There seems to be a major disregard for the traffic laws in our City, and hopefully through this kind of effort, through education and through enforcement we can kind of get ourselves back into a more calm and safer environment for our kids and for everybody who lives in Philadelphia. I would like to recognize Councilwoman Miller, who has a comment.

Thank you, Councilman. I'd just like to reiterate the comments of Councilman Kenney and just restate that the safety of our children here in this City is most important. The safety of them traveling to and from school is just as important as the deterrent and all the publicity and the community action that's taken place around the gun violence that's been mowing our children down. So I'm glad that we're going to have this discussion today. I was certainly very pleased to read 7 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 in the paper that the School District is going to put money up, the $1 million for the school flashing lights, which we think is also important, and it does help deter some of the speeders. Enforcement is the issue. This is a very important topic here in Philadelphia and I'm glad to see other states here that will be participating in today's hearing because we need to look at best practices that's happening around the country. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd also like to acknowledge the presence of Councilman Frank Rizzo and Councilman Brian O'Neill. Our first witnesses today are Brian Simpson and Tamisha Johnson, who are parents of Denarah Williams, who has experienced this terrible situation as a family and as a young person, and we'd like to ask them to come forward and to give us some indication of what their experience has been with their daughter 8 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 being struck. I'd like to take the opportunity to thank you for taking time out of your schedule and your day to come here and speak with us today. We'd like to first make sure you relax and just tell how you feel and talk freely to us. Please identify yourself for the record, because the stenographer wants to make a record of that. Either one, feel free to begin.

My name is Brian Simpson.

Tamisha Johnson.

Whoever would like to start.

Actually, October 10th, I was feeling sick that day so I decided to stay home from work. We had my sister-in-law come into the house telling us that Denarah had been struck by a vehicle. So Tamisha ran down the corner and checked on Denarah to see what happened. By the time she got there, that person that struck her was already out of the vehicle and attending to 9 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 her. Tamisha got there first. I came out secondly. They were already in an ambulance. And basically what happened was, the crossing guard was trying to handle a bunch of kids crossing the street and Denarah stopped and was waiting for her brother. And the crossing guard told him to go ahead on, and the person who struck her did a pitted stop right at the intersection. In my opinion, I think she was traveling a little excessively when she pit stopped right at the intersection.

How far do you live from the school?

About a block away.

And she normally walks to school by herself?

With her sister and brother.

What were the extent of her injuries?

She had a broken leg. Her bone actually came out of her leg. She had a contusion on her head. She had to go to 10 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 surgery and she had to be re-hospitalized after she was discharged from the hospital because she caught an infection in her leg.

How is she doing now?

She's doing much better now.

She's up and about running around. She brought her grades back up.

Good. Did the police investigate the incident? Were there police reports.

Yes.

Were there any tickets issued to the driver?

I'm not sure.

Had you noticed any changes at the school intersection?

No. Sometimes when I come home from work -- I work 11:00 to 7:00. By the time I get there it's, like, 7:30, 8:00 and there's still no crossing guards where the children are walking. 11 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Also where my children go to school, there's no traffic light, like a red, green and yellow, so children just run across the street and it's, like, a busy intersection.

Is there a stop sign or is there any type of signaling signs there?

There's a yellow sign behind the tree. We've been seeing it since we moved into the area. No one notices the sign, but if people are traveling in the neighborhood, you know where the school is. They just zoom past Wayne Avenue. We live on Wayne Avenue. They zoom past Wayne Avenue on Manheim trying to catch the light. They're doing about 40 miles an hour. By the time they start slowing down, they're in the middle of the next block, almost on Pulaski.

So a lot of this excessive speed is a result of trying to make the green light?

Sometimes they come from around the bus. If the bus stops, they 12 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 don't want to wait for the bus to load the passengers. They'll come from around the bus and go right through. Last March they had mauled three children from coming behind the bus.

That's included when the bus is stopped with its stop sign out and its flashers on?

Yes.

And the people still continue around?

Yes.

Are you talking about a school bus or something?

No. I'm talking about a SEPTA bus.

Oh, a SEPTA bus. Not a school bus?

No, not the school bus.

Are there any questions for these witnesses?

Where was your little girl hit? 13 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

She was hit at the corner of Manheim and Pulaski.

There's a four-way stop sign there, correct?

Yes.

I represent Kelly School. Your child goes to Kelly, John B. Kelly?

Yes.

One of the things that we talked about when we had a couple meetings at John B. Kelly when the three children were hit by the car that went around the bus -- and we kind of think he blew the stop sign, and they were crossing and he couldn't see them because the bus was there. But one of the things that came to our attention -- when I thought about it, it's true -- we teach our children how to cross, You know, you go on the green light. I walked my niece to school the other day, and we were standing at the corner and I said, "No, you cross when the light is green." 14 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 One of the things that we have to do is to start trying to figure out how we can teach our children how to cross at stop signs. Because you know yourself, and I know for me, if you're trying to either get through the stop sign or if you're trying to cross through the stop sign, you know, get through with the vehicles, the traffic just keeps coming. They stop, but it kind of keeps coming. So at some point I guess we need help with trying to help teach our children how to cross at stop signs. But also, I think drivers should have to be more sensitive to when they're driving in a school area, just like one of you said, and slow down and stop speeding. Because speeding through something and you injure a child, it wasn't worth it. It wasn't worth it.

I agree with what you're saying. For instance, with our kids, before we moved to Wayne Avenue, we lived at Rittenhouse and Morris. To get to their school was about a 20-minute walk to Felton Elementary. In between there and our house 15 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 are stop signs and traffic lights, so I teach them about how to look out for different intersections, stop, wait until there is no 5 traffic and then proceed. I do not teach them to stand at the corner, don't wait at the very tip of the corner because most people that turn the corner either don't have licenses or don't have insurance and they'll take the corner doing and 30 miles an hour. So I 11 teach them to stand back at least six feet and 12 wait until it's clear. 13 I'm pretty confident that Denarah 14 didn't do anything as far being at that 15 corner. 16 But I do agree with what you're 17 saying, teaching them how to cross the 18 intersections and stop signs, because I see a 19 lot of kids just dart out in the middle of the 20 street a lot. Some days I just wake up late before I go to school at night and I see the kids darting in the middle of the street, playing tag or full of book bags so they're not paying attention.

Councilman 16 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 O'Neill.

Following up on Councilwoman Miller and the stop signs, I think we should all recognize that in Philadelphia over the last to 30 years the 7 idea of a stop sign being a suggestion rather 8 than an order is the way it goes. I had first 9 heard it years ago being called the South 10 Philly slide, but it's really the Philadelphia 11 slide. And people do slow down; I wouldn't 12 say they blow through stop signs as if they're 13 not there, but they don't come to a stop. 14 That used to be enforced by Philadelphia 15 Police and doing traffic enforcement as part 16 of their duties. It ended a long time ago. 17 I don't want to blame one 18 Administration or one Commissioner, but I do 19 know that Philadelphia drivers drive 20 differently when they leave the City borders, whether it's going into one of our counties in Pennsylvania or across the bridge to New Jersey because they still enforce a stop sign as an order to stop, and come to a full stop. It's not enforced in Philadelphia at all. And 17 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 that can cause by itself the kind of injuries we're talking about here today. Thank you.

Councilman Rizzo.

You know that there's legislation pending, and I think honestly politics has entered into the delay of the installation of the red light cameras. I'm only telling you that for some background, that we are eventually going to have red light cameras at some of the real dangerous intersections. I believe during one of the budget hearings -- and not privately, but publicly -- I had a conversation with the Police Department, and I asked that possibly some type of a program be initiated to really get aggressive when it comes to violators of stop signs, and especially red lights, until we have some of these major intersections under control with camera control. And I was disappointed when the answer that I got back from the Police Commissioner was that our 18 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 police officers, if they see someone run a red light, that they'll issue a ticket. I don't think that was good enough. I see the Managing Director -- at least he was here a moment ago -- to ask the Police Department if they have to come up with a campaign to go after people that violate red lights. Councilman O'Neill and Kenney mentioned that this is really a culture issue, I think, here in the City of Philadelphia. And something has to be done. And if we really need to get aggressive on people -- I live in a neighborhood where stop means 10 miles an hour at a stop sign. You can tell that they don't stop. So I would appeal to the Managing Director, the Administration, to ask the Police Department to come up with a very aggressive campaign to remind the officers -- from my opinion, is that they're so very busy out there, that enforcing traffic violators is not as high a priority as it was once when we had more police officers. And also the fact that many times 19 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 when we see a person run a red light and we see a police officer not responding, many times they're involved in responding to another assignment where they can't stop the person that they observe. So many times we think that they're just not doing their job, but really they are and they just can't be distracted from the assignment that they have. So I appeal to the Administration in asking them to come up with a campaign and we get very aggressive when it comes to enforcement. I don't think that's the case right now. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much. If there's no other questions for these witnesses, I'd like to thank you for taking the time to come in and wish you and you daughter well. Hopefully. This experience hasn't caused her any mental anguish and hopefully as time goes on she'll fully recover. Thank you for taking the time. Our next witness is Harvey Rice. 20 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 He's a Philadelphia School District Safe Schools Advocate. And Patricia Raymond, Philadelphia Home and School Association President. Please identify yourself for the record.

Harvey Rice, the Safe Schools Advocate.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon. I'm Harvey Rice, Pennsylvania Department of Education Safe Schools Advocate for the School District of Philadelphia. As a Safe Schools Advocate, it is my job to advocate for victims of school violence and monitor the School District's compliance with the Safe Schools Act, as well as making recommendations to improve school safety and help keep our children safe at school. Parents should feel secure knowing their children are safe, not only while they are in school, but also on their way to school and back home again. Statistics reveal that between 80 and 90 percent of all Philadelphia 21 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 elementary school students walk to and from school. Alarmingly, in recent years we have seen a steady rise in the number of students being struck by vehicles on their way to and from school. So far this year, 70 students have been struck by vehicles, and we still have over six weeks to go before the end of the school year. Last year, 72 children were struck by moving vehicles and 52 children struck during the 2001-2002 school year. Almost 300 children have been struck by moving vehicles during the past three years. Fortunately, there have been no fatalities. 75 percent of these accidents took place right outside the school building. The lack of consistency in placing crossing guards at key intersections near local schools throughout the City each and every school day is a contributing factor in many of cases where students are hit by vehicles going to and from school. The Office of Safe Schools Advocate has received numerous complaints from parents about corners close to their child's school 22 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 where there is no consistent placement of crossing guards each and every day of the school year. Today, I submit a list of those schools for your review with my testimony. One parent reported back in October of 2002 that the crossing guard usually assigned to the corner at 70th and Old York Road was absent for more than a month. The child of this parent who attended Ellwood Elementary School notified the 35th Police District and found that the guard was on a long-term sick leave and no replacement was ever assigned. Eventually, four months later, police officers were assigned the task of crossing the students at this intersection. So for five months out of the school year that year that corner was without a crossing guard. There is also an issue with the coordinated deployment, training and monitoring of the more than 1,000 crossing guards charged with protecting children on the way to and from school. Some crossing guards are stationed at corners where very few children travel, and there are other corners 23 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 in the City with high traffic by children, yet no crossing guards. Another likely contributing factor to these accidents is the absence of blinking yellow lights and miles per hour signs at 7 more than half of the schools in the City. In 8 many cases, the yellow blinking lights are not 9 operational during arrival and dismissal 10 times, which leads to most motorists ignoring 11 the posted 15 miles per hour speed limit signs 12 that are posted, combined with the lack of 13 consistent police enforcement in these 14 restricted speeding school zones. 15 As the Daily News reported, no 16 school zone speeding violation tickets were issued last year. During the 2001-2002 school year, two tickets were issued and the prior year before that one ticket was issued. Illegal parking in the front of schools in clearly posted no-parking zones during school hours creates blind spots for most motorists and children and is a serious contributing factor to the number of incidents involving children getting struck by vehicles 24 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 to and from school.

With 75 percent of these accidents occurring directly outside the school, better enforcement of the no-parking zones in front of schools could dramatically reduce the number of accidents involving our school children. The School District of Philadelphia has enacted many programs to address this problem, such as the Safe Corridors Program, the Walking Bus Tour, and incorporation of school safety programs into the school curriculum. However, the Safe Corridors Program is only operational in 38 of the 264 schools, or less than percent of all our 16 schools. 17 While these programs are worthwhile 18 measures, the School District of Philadelphia 19 cannot solve this problem alone. While many 20 concerned parents volunteer their time to watch over their children and other children at some of these key intersections, they cannot and should not be the first line of defense in protecting children going to and from school. 25 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 I want to thank this Committee, especially you, Chairman Kenney, for looking into this dangerous problem, and offer my help and assistance in finding a solution that will reduce, if not eliminate, the number of vehicular accidents involving school children. By way of recommendations, I would strongly urge that a comprehensive training of all crossing guards take place and that crossing guard deployment decisions take into account the number of school walkers versus the level of vehicle traffic at key intersections. Additionally, better daily monitoring of crossing guard attendance should take place so when a crossing guard doesn't show up for work, a substitute can be sent to replace them for that day, or longer if necessary. I would also strongly urge that all no-parking and reduced speed limit zones around schools be strictly enforced during school hours. I believe the Philadelphia Police Department must adopt a zero tolerance 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 policy towards illegal parking in front of schools and excessive speeding in school zones. These measures, while basic and manageable, need the commitment of the City police and, where applicable, the State police. In suburban school districts, 9 mile per hour school zones are taken very 10 seriously and they mean something. Drivers 11 are ticketed at higher levels and the courts 12 take a no-nonsense approach to violators 13 speeding in school zones. A driver who is 14 caught speeding in a school reduced speeding 15 zone can get up to five points against their license and possibly lose their license for a period of time. While the City is facing a budget shortfall and departments are being asked to do more with less, I urge this Council to resist making any budget cuts on the backs of our school children. I would urge that yellow blinking lights and 15 mile per hour speed signs be posted in every school zone in Philadelphia, 27 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 public, charter, private and parochial, and that strict enforcement of these zones be enforced. This problem can be solved if addressed adequately and immediately. I commend Councilman Kenney and the Members of this Committee for taking the initiative to listen to concerned citizens. I hope this Committee makes the necessary recommendations to fix this problem and that the necessary departments and agencies act to implement your recommendations. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be a part of this discussion.

Thank you. I'd ask Ms. Raymond to identify yourself and proceed with your testimony, and then we'll open up the questioning for both of you.

My name is Pat Raymond. I'm currently serving as the president of the Philadelphia Home and School Council, which is the volunteer parent organization that's in every school known as 28 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Home and School Associations. My part of the board oversees what happens daily in the schools across the City. And like I said, it is strictly volunteer. I'm here, like you are, because I've been voted into office. So I would ask you for a moment to just imagine these halls filled with parents because I am their voice. They're out manning your city, your hospitals, your police force, your fire department, building new buildings and everything. So that's why I'm here. I'm voted to do that. Every day the press brings us heartbreaking reports of our children being victimized, brutalized or paying the ultimate price, with their young lives. As parents we struggle daily to educate our children about and protect them from the perils of the real world. Our babies are exposed to war, disease, crime and natural disasters on a daily basis. But should our children have to fear for their lives doing the one thing that can point them in the right direction, doing the one thing that can prepare them to be an 29 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 active, viable member of society? Every day in every neighborhood across the City of Philadelphia children are risking their well-being just by going to and from school. With the number of vehicles and drivers at an all-time high and the ever-increasing pace of our society, parents and caregivers are bombarding the City streets surrounding our schools, parking in bus lanes, double parking, triple parking, parking on sidewalks, crosswalks and intersections blocking streets is going on every day at every school in our City. Add to that the fact that the no-parking regulation around schools is not being enforced and you have the recipe for disaster. The number of students being hurt in these situations is at an all-time high. This is not a record that we can be proud of. The answer to this issue seems to be very simplistic: No parking around schools and obeying all traffic laws even during the opening and closing of schools. Gosh, if life were only that simple. 30 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 We witness daily the abuse that the School District of Philadelphia staff, volunteers and Philadelphia's finest have to withstand when dealing with irate people who will only be a minute trying to drop off and pick up a student. And what about the poor sucker who just happened to be driving by the City school at the wrong time? The village we have enlisted to raise our children seems to be getting a little testy when they get in their vehicles to go somewhere, even when children are involved. I'm really not certain what the solution to the issue is. I understand our City has a budget deficit. I know our School District is in a permanent state of deficit. I know our police force is understaffed and crossing guards are few and far between. Parents and children feel that our streets are not safe, which is one reason why so many children are being driven to and from school. But most importantly, I know that we cannot sacrifice one more child to the ignorance of a society that is in a hurry and out for number 31 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 one. We must pledge from this moment to work together to enlist the aid of all parties to ensure that our babies don't become statistics. If we don't find a solution, we just might lose that one special child who would have grown up to discover the cure for cancer, how to obtain world peace, or better yet, how to make our school system the best in the nation. And if I can just speak from my heart for a minute. We have an office in the School District building. Every day we get phone calls on how can I get a new crossing guard, how do I do this, so and so got hurt, parents fighting with each other.

They call my office and expect us to go in and mediate between these parents who are ready to kill each other because so-and-so stole somebody else's parking spot or, you know, she said she was leaving or whatever. My mother always taught me that growing hurts. I really have to agree with what Councilman O'Neill said. My husband is 32 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 teaching my 16-year-old how to drive. And when we get to Bucks County, he told her -- I was floored. He sat in the back seat of the car and he said, "Okay, now. " Yet, this is what society mandates. And I've got to tell you she was scared to death to drive. She's still scared to death to drive. If we don't enforce the laws on the books, nothing is going to make a difference. And I think that's the issue here. Whatever we do, whatever resolve we can find, we need to ensure that we're going to enforce it because we are really being lax. Philadelphia is -- you're right, not the South Philly slide. I can't remember the last time I was behind somebody that actually stopped at a stop sign or even a traffic light. You don't have to because Philly's not going to do anything about it. 33 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

Did you ever notice when you stop at a stop sign, come to a full stop and you allow a senior citizen to cross the street, they look at you like you are crazy? It's like, "Are you sure? Can I go?" Because they're so used to waiting because no one stops. Let me ask you a question about the parking around the school, because I know both of you have dealt with complaints and conflict relative to that. The cause of the problem is the double parking because there are cars along the curb around the schools. So when people come before school or after school and drop off kids, they double park because those spots are already taken. Do we have an idea just anecdotally whether or not these are neighborhood people parking there, whether it's staff from the school parking there? If we are able to strictly enforce the no parking around schools, I'm trying to determine who's going to be screaming the loudest.

Everybody.

It's a mixture. At some 34 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 schools there isn't a yard for the teachers or the staff to park so they park around the school because they feel the closer the car is to the school, the safer their vehicle will be. Others, it is neighborhood people. It's people going to school for meetings or whatever. So it's a mixture.

I know anecdotally it's a big conflict. There's constant arguing and issues. For example, there's a charter school on South Broad Street in Councilwoman Verna's district, Broad and Shunk, between Shunk and Oregon. At 2:00 to 2:30 in the afternoon we have traffic backed up to almost City Hall going south because of all the double parking and the cars having to merge into one lane. And that goes on for about a 45-minute to an hour clip. Is there any interface between the principal or the vice principal in the school charged with kind of safety of staff and parents, or is it just kind of whatever happens, happens?

I've actually had 35 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 conversations with principals that have begged me to try to do something. Because every day they have cars parked in the bus zones. One example is the Rush Middle School up on Woodhaven Road. The principal pleaded with me, please do something. They've got a parking lot that when you're going in the proper direction on Knights Road you can pull in the parking lot, make a circle and drop your child off. But it's much easier to go double park on the sidewalk where the buses are supposed to be discharging their students. The principal has tried. At meetings they tried issuing citations because you're doing a good job, you know, trying to deal with it positively and it ultimately --

Citations being merit awards or something, not tickets?

Well, yes. Like, thanks, you did a good job. Try to do the positive thing. Ultimately they've had to call the police out because they've literally had fist-fights in the middle of Knights Road over parking. 36 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Other communities you go into, the neighbors don't want you parking in their spot because that's their spot. They know if you park there, when they come home you're not going to be there. It's just really an issue around the City.

One of the things that we're going to have to brace ourselves for if, in fact, we decide to pursue this no parking around the schools is a cacophony of people complaining to all these elected officials, myself included, as to that issue. But one of the things that I would like to take a look at is -- I know the Parking Authority starts in their meter enforcement zones probably I think around 10:00 or so, between 9:00 and 10:00 because I see the vans of the enforcement officers going out and being dropped off at various locations. I was wondering -- and we'll pursue a question to the Parking Authority on whether or not their people could be utilized at an earlier time around schools to begin the 37 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 appropriate no-parking tickets. I know that will create a raft of complaint. However, over a period of time, I'm wondering if it would not in some way change the behavior of the people who are coming there. Because I know myself, my children attended parochial school in South Philadelphia about a block and a half from my house, and believe it or not, many people drive their kids to school where there's no 12 need to be driven. Our crossing guard last year was severely injured with compound fractures of her leg because she got backed up by a mother who was in a hurry and put the car in reverse instead of drive and ran her over. She was in a cast with pins in her legs nearly a year. I'm wondering whether or not kind of trying to curb that behavior through parking tickets -- I don't know the answer to it -- would maybe make some people get their kids there another way as opposed to driving them.

If I could offer a 38 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 suggestion. I'm real good at that, but I don't have any finances to back it up, so... but I think if we do some kind of media campaign. It doesn't have to be elaborate. But if we give people a heads-up that on whatever the date is going to be, this is what's going to happen if you double park, if you triple park, whatever, you are going to be subject to this, because then you've given them a heads-up. It is going to hurt. It's going to hurt before it gets better but, unfortunately, that's the reality of the situation.

The choice is either you have some pain and some complaint or you have kids continually being hit. I think the choice is pretty clear, although it will be a painful political choice.

I also will offer my services. Our organization, we are the parents of the children in public schools. If we can be part of the campaign to kind of be proactive instead of reactive, it might be better to make parents responsible for their 39 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 own behavior. Honestly it's not really just parents. It's the rest of the citizens too. With my children comes two sets of grandparents, some aunts and uncles. You know what I mean? So if we just kind of give them a heads-up, if we make them accountable for their own behavior and then once the deadline is passed, you know, you were told, you were warned.

Harvey, do you have anything else to add?

No. 14

Councilman Rizzo had a question.

If we do start enforcing the no parking around the schools, what I appeal to the Managing Director is that we do a survey to make sure -- because I know that signs are faded in many places. They're missing because of the fact that there's nobody enforcing them, so why worry about it. So before we start issuing tickets, I would hope we communicate clearly to the people that are parking that they shouldn't be parking 40 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 there. Not that I remember this, but I understand -- I do remember. We had a program in the schools called Safeties.

It's still there.

And I didn't realize we even still had them because I don't see any safeties working with the school crossing guards. Has the program slipped away?

It's not cool to be a safety. AAA still works with the schools. It's actually an EC position. A teacher has to sign up to be responsible for the safety patrol. If a teacher doesn't sign up to do that, you don't have a safety patrol.

I don't think I've ever seen one. The concept worked pretty good because anybody that got picked to be a safety, you're like a hotshot.

Well, now you're a nerd if you get picked to be a safety. It's not cool.

Maybe we can 41 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 change the culture there. I would think that that would be something that should be revisited, at least strengthen it up. So that was all I wanted to contribute, was the fact that if we do start writing tickets -- and I hope the Managing Director is listening. The thing that bothers me is, do you ever see people that park facing the wrong way on a two-way street? Well, rather than give lots of tickets out in one particular district, the captain came up with a document that warned people before they actually wrote the ticket. They went through the community -- the police officers actually had them in the car and said, in case you're not aware -- and a lot of people honestly did not realize parking the wrong way on a two-way street was a violation of the Motor Vehicle Code. The community really liked the fact that the police officers were reaching out to them. And any time the police officer saw one that was not an immediate dangerous situation, left a little flyer in this particular area around 42 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Fairmount Park where they were doing that. Just for convenience they would pull over and park the wrong way. I'd like to see something like that occur, maybe try to reach out to them before we issue tickets.

I totally agree. I'm sorry that I have such a big mouth, Harvey, but that's why I'm in this position.

That's part of the qualifications.

Maybe what we need to be is proactive again. And assuming that nobody really is kind of boned up on what the traffic rules and regulations and parking rules and regulations are in the City, maybe the City could publish a tri-fold or something that the police, the schools, everybody could give out.

It made the police in that particular community look human. They weren't just going out there and writing the ticket. They left a little flyer on the car, and many people respected that. 43 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 They said, I wasn't aware. Even if they were aware, they cleaned up their act. And now that the Managing Director is back, I'd like to restate what I said earlier, that I was disappointed at the lack of interest from the Police Department in reference to a campaign to enforce red light running and other violations of the Motor Vehicle Code. The Police Commissioner stated to me that basically if the police see a person run a red light, they'll do what they're supposed to do, issue a ticket. Well, Mr. Managing Director, that's not good enough. I think we really need to have a campaign in the City, have an aggressive campaign until red light cameras come. That's only going to affect a few intersections, the red light cameras. I would appreciate you asking the Police Commissioner to cooperate and go out there and really do an aggressive campaign to get these red light runners and other violators under control. Councilman O'Neill or Kenney, I forget which said it, that when you leave 44 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Philadelphia and go in the suburbs, everybody changes the way they drive, because if you go into Abington Township or Montgomery County, all of a sudden everybody starts playing by the rules. When you're in Philadelphia, there aren't any. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd like to acknowledge the presence of Councilman Cohen and Councilman Nutter. Are there any other questions for these witnesses? (No response.)

This panel is excused. Thank you very much for coming in. Our third panel today is Ms. Leigh Matusick, who's the Florida School Crossing Guard Program Administrator. Dr. Walter "Skip" Brown, who's the Paradise Valley School District Superintendent in Phoenix, Arizona. Jennifer Toole, who is a traffic consultant in Baltimore Maryland. 45 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Could you please come forward? I believe that Ms. Toole is going to do a presentation from that desk there. Please identify yourself for the record and proceed with your testimony and presentation.

My name is Jennifer Toole. I'm the president of Toole Design Group, a planning and engineering firm based in Baltimore, Maryland. And I want to thank you very much. I'm very honored to have been asked to come and testify. You'll have to forgive me, I can't talk about pedestrian safety without showing pictures, so first to just give you a little bit of information on my background. I am the President of Toole Design Group. I formed my firm specifically to focus on planning and engineering safer streets for pedestrian and bicycles. And because of that specialty, we've had the opportunity to work on several routes to school programs over the past three years. We were the primary consultant for Maryland's Safe Routes to School Pilot 46 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Program. That was a two-year effort to work in two schools in Maryland. One of those schools was an inner-city Baltimore school with issues very similar to what you're facing here in Philadelphia. We are also the consultant for Delaware DOT's Safe Routes to School Program, as well as a national Safe Routes to School training course that's being developed by the Federal Highway Administration. So this is something very that's very near and dear to my heart. This is my son. I also come from the perspective of a parent as well. I also want to mention that I have worked in Philadelphia before. We were the consultant for the Philadelphia Bicycle Master Plan. In a previous job I was a project manager for that plan. So I've experienced the City as a motorist, as a pedestrian and as a bicyclist too quite a bit over the past eight years. I wanted to sort of explain what the Safe Routes to School movement is and what components there are. We talked a lot about 47 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 enforcement. That's one component of a Safe Routes to School Program. I think one thing that most people agree on is that we really need for children to be able to walk to school. And when you look at the obesity statistics among children, the rising statistics, the percent of children who are overweight, I can tell you that that blue line continues to go up and children are making fewer and fewer trips on foot. This is a real serious health issue for kids. So we want children to be able to walk to school. It's really also an issue of personal independence. I think we all remember the first time we got to walk someplace on our own. It's that feeling of self worth I think that's very important for kids. The realities in a City like Philadelphia, though, are that those trips are often not safe. You see this happening all the time. Kids going to school, sometimes they have to be there early for the early breakfast program. It's still the early dawn 48 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 hours and it's just a very dangerous mix. In Baltimore we know that we're killing an astonishing number of kids, killing and injuring them on the streets. They're three times more likely to be killed or injured as pedestrians than any of the other urban counties in Maryland. So this is a serious issue in many other places, as well as here in Philadelphia. We also know that the morning rush hour is a real problem as well. Twenty to twenty-five percent of the rush hour traffic is school traffic, and this is the same here in Philadelphia as well. That morning chaos of parents arriving at the same time that children are arriving on foot, it's a very dangerous mix. So, to talk about sort of what the ingredients are for a successful program. It's very important that a Safe Routes Program address not only the engineering side of things, sort of the physical environment side, but also the education and enforcement side. Previous speakers have talked about that. 49 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Those things in combination are what make a difference and make kids safer. It's not one single thing and no others; it's all of those things together. A second very important thing is that the program must involve parents.

Because if one of the goals is to get parents to drive their kids to school less, then you have to address their concerns, their reasons why they're driving their kids to school. And then the engineering components really have to be outside the box. I'm going to show you some pictures of things that other communities have done to address the engineering components. One thing we know about roadway design is that speed kills. The faster a car is going when it strikes a pedestrian, the more likely that pedestrian will die. And so, you can see at 40 miles an hour the pedestrian chance of death is up around 85 percent. That's pretty high. If we can get those traffic speeds down to 20 miles an hour you can tremendously reduce their chances of 50 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 death. That's a very important feature of any kind of engineering program for Safe Routes. Now, the evidence on flashing beacons now in Philadelphia is mixed. I want to make sure that you understand that in some places flashing beacons do have an effect on speeds, but they don't always have an effect. So I'm going to encourage you to do other things as well as flashing beacons. They're good for a start. And when they're combined with other safety measures they can be very effective.

I just want to interrupt you for one second. Councilman Rizzo earlier today had mentioned to me that he was going to bring up the issue that they're solar powered, the flashers, as opposed to what we've been installing on the electric-based ones that we have here in Philadelphia.

That's in Lancaster.

Can I jump in?

Absolutely. Certainly.

We have seen 51 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 these little trailers that monitor the speed are very effective. Are any of those permanent?

I'm getting ready to show you a picture, in fact. I think I've already said this. Signs and paints are a good first step, but sometimes they don't have a significant effect on behavior. We should know that from research studies. This is exactly what you're talking about. This is permanent speed sign and it's in front of a school in Rockville, Maryland. This very spot is where a child was killed about three years ago. I should point out that that child was killed because he stepped directly in front of a car. He was at fault. The child was at fault. That's the reason why you have to have the education side. But this is the engineering solution that they put in place and it has been very effective. They've got a crosswalk there, the warning signs. That is a very bright warning sign. It's called a fluorescent yellow-green warning sign. If you can see in the background, the 52 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 solar device is in the back and then there's the speed limit sign. And this is what it looks like from the other direction. It also has a pedestrian bollard that's positioned in the middle of the street to remind drivers that they're required by law to yield to pedestrians in the crosswalk. So that's been a very effective sign. The day I was out looking at it no 11 one was going faster than 25 miles an hour. I watched the speed sign, so. That's just a close-up of what a pedestrian bollard looks like. These are being used in Pennsylvania. They've been sanctioned for use in certain crosswalks. They're not for every spot. They are a maintenance issue because they get hit a lot, as you can imagine. One thing that is very important, though, especially for children, is to divide up the task of crossing the street wherever you can, especially in mid-block locations where -- and children do have to cross at mid-block locations occasionally. So this is an example of a device, a median crossing 53 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 island, where a child can cross one direction of traffic and then wait and be safe while they're waiting before they cross the other direction. It also has a traffic calming effect. People don't feel comfortable driving past one of these things as fast. So drivers tend to slow down. Just another view of a little less expensive center median device at an intersection. This is in Sacramento, California. Another important thing to do is to try to shorten that crossing distance as much as possible. Here is an example where they took out a few parking spaces in order to make that crossing distance narrower, so that you've reduced the pedestrian's exposure while they're out in the street. It's a very important safety measure. In my testimony packet I included a safety study that just came out in this month's American Journal of Public Health, and it's on the benefits of speed humps. They did a study in Oakland, California. Children 54 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 living within one block of a speed hump were 50 to 60 percent less likely to be injured by a car. It's a pretty significant finding. I don't want to leave the impression that we should put these everywhere because they're also very annoying to drivers. They do create some political backlash because they're just annoying. But they work in some locations. They can be very effective if they're combined, again, with other devices. Here is an example of one. Actually, this is in front of my son's school in Howard County, Maryland. It's combined. It's a pedestrian crossing combined with a speed table, so it's a very gentle -- it's not a bump, but it's kind of an elongated table crossing. Then there are a variety of other devices that you can use to calm traffic. These are used all throughout the country. This is a traffic diverter. It's something that encourages drivers to go slower, and it can be as fancy or as simple as you want to make them. It just makes it more 55 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 uncomfortable for drivers to speed.

Another device that is being used is the pedestrian count-down signal. This is a device that tells the pedestrian how much more time they have to get across the street, which is very important information to know. It's especially good for wide street crossings, where you need to know if it's appropriate start that crossing or not. Already in Philadelphia you have some leading pedestrian intervals. This is essentially just an all red phase that gives the pedestrians a chance to get out into the crosswalk before that turning traffic starts. That's another device that you all are already using that can be very effective. There are all kinds of other things. This is a traffic circle. Seattle, Washington uses a lot of traffic circles to calm traffic in neighborhoods. A Safe Routes to School Program starts with an assessment of needs. We typically do parent surveys. We find out what the parents are concerned about. We find out 56 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 how many kids are walking to school. We do workshops. And then we of course do an engineering analysis as well. And I guess I want to stress -- and Ms. Raymond said this as well -- but for a Safe Routes Program to be successful it must motivate parents to become involved. The schools that we've worked in, the parents have probably played the strongest role on the enforcement side. They have been the ones that stand out in front of the school and yell at the other parents when they don't do the drop off right. You can really gain a lot by including the parents. These are just a few pictures from the Save Routes Programs that we did in Maryland. The parents really enjoy getting involved in this stuff. They will go out and do the site surveys. We've held community workshops that have had many, many of the parents from the school attending. These are just some of the concerns that we have heard from parents. I think the last one on that list is important too. 57 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 They're worried that their kids are going to get abducted, and that's why they don't want them to walk to school sometimes. That's another issue that you have to deal with. A good Safe Routes Program moves forward both with the physical changes and the education projects. Most kids don't get a whole lot of pedestrian safety education in school. They get a lot of fire safety education. But it hasn't traditionally been part of the curriculum. And so that's another thing that we're working on in Maryland, is getting more pedestrian safety into the schools. And there's some great curricula out there that you can take right off the shelf and use. Another important part of our program in Maryland is Motorist Public Awareness Campaigns. This is the Street Smart Program that we're in the second year of doing, and this is a public campaign to make motorists aware that they need to be alert for pedestrians. It's a very important campaign and it's combined with an effort from the 58 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Police Department to crack down on motorists that don't yield to pedestrians. It's called a Pedestrian Crosswalk Sting. And what the police officers do is they put out a dummy officer who crosses the street and another officer tickets all the drivers who don't yield --

Not a dumb officer.

Right. And I should mention also at that program that the Washington D.C. Area developed this program, and they've been willing to share it with anybody who wants the materials. So if this is something that you're interested in, you could get this and put it up on your buses and at your bus stops as well. Of course every good program includes an assessment of conditions in the neighborhood. This is that Baltimore City school that I was talking about. This is just a map that shows all of the pedestrian accidents in that neighborhood around that school. The parents actually mapped out the 59 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 children's walking routes around the school, and then those are the places that we focused on. This is just a view of one of the crossings directly in front of the school. That crossing guard had been hit by a car before. She no longer would go all the way out into the road to help kids cross because she was too afraid for her own safety. That program included a new drop-off program, and the parents were the ones that enforced it. It got initially some help from the police officers, but the ongoing enforcement was done by the parents as well as, again, shortening those crossing distances right in front of the school and providing better crossing facilities. So a good program includes a variety of other ongoing promotions, and this is just some of the programs that have been put in place in Maryland and other places at our school. In Baltimore, we had grandparents who served as corner captains, and they would stand at different corners. They had T-shirts made up for themselves and they would just 60 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 sort of monitor children's crossings. You can't put a crossing guard at every corner. We also got the kids involved as well. They did a logo contest for the Safe Routes Programs. It's amazing how well the children understand the problems. So that's the end of my presentation. Thank you very much for inviting me.

Thank you very much. If you could go back to the main witness table because there may be a few questions. You had indicated that there were studies done on both speed bumps and tables. Is there any statistics relative to rumble strips that are less intrusive, I guess, to the driver as far as bouncing of the car? I know when you go into a toll lane and you hit those rumble strips or if you go off onto the side of the highway, on the shoulder, you hear that. Has there been any studies relative to the effectiveness of those? 61 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

I believe there have been studies on rumble strips, and they are used sometimes as a traffic calming device. We use them in Maryland at times. The problem you'll have is that the bicyclists will hate them. They will be very loud about how much they don't like this.

Well, if they're only in the areas of the streets surrounding schools theoretically.

If they don't stretch across the entire lane, if a bicyclist can get around them. But they are a surface hazard for a bicyclist. They can cause bicyclists difficulty.

Well, if the traffic is calm in the school zones the bicyclists are safer too, I would think.

That's true.

Councilman Rizzo.

Just from my observations here in Philadelphia, it seems as though the principals of the school or the 62 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 management of the school, they're out of the loop when it come to this part. They don't believe it's their responsibility. I constantly drive -- especially around daylight savings time where our technology is antiquated. I think we all know what these new atomic clocks are. They reset themselves. And there's digital timers. One of the problems that I think we're having here in the City is if there's a power outage in a community, there's nothing worse than to a see flasher on at 2:00 a.m. In the morning. Is there technology out there that would make it less of a maintenance issue where the atomic clock technology could be used to reset them, the signals, and also have a way to digitally set the times? Because the slightest black-out in a particular area throws the signal's sequence off terribly, and constantly they claim it's a terrible maintenance issue. Is there anything that you know of out there, that if we do start installing the radar signs or the flashing lights, any technology that could be less 63 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 maintenance?

I don't know. I don't know if there is. What I didn't tell you is that that speed sign that I showed you the picture of, on the other side it wasn't working. It had zeros. Everybody who was going was not speeding. So I think that the maintenance issue is something that might be solved a little bit by technology, because we're certainly getting better in that respect, but it's probably not going to go away. And that's why, as much as you can, if you can do other geometric things to shorten those crossing distances and improve crosswalks, it helps.

Well, our Turnpike Commission and our Garden State Parkway have all those radar signs, the ones that give you the speed as pull into the toll booth. It tells you how fast you're going. And I've asked the question. And that part of the technology seems to be working very well. But the earlier problem that I described where when they're supposed to be 64 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 working during dismissal time, they're not. And I really believe -- and the School District should be listening -- I think that the oversight of any program, like you mentioned the bollard, if the bollard is not there, somebody from the school should be responsible to make sure that it's ordered or it's replaced. I don't think you can put this burden on the Streets Department to manage it, to actually manage a school safety zone program. I think the School District has to be more involved. Would you agree or not?

The others here could probably answer too. But traditionally it has not been the School District. The schools typically don't have jurisdiction over anything but their property.

I'm not suggesting that they are out there installing and repairing. I'm talking when deficiencies occur, when the signs are flashing at 11:00 in the morning instead of 8:00 in the morning, that someone from the School District should be responsible to report to the maintenance 65 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 people that there's a problem here. I mean, I've called schools and the principal -- and no names -- says, "Oh, yeah. It's been like that for two months now." That, to me, is not good.

Thank you. What I'd like to do, if possible, is whoever would like to go next in sequence of testimony, I'd like to get all the testimony in prior to additional questions, if possible. Please identify yourself for the record.

Hello, Mr. Chairman and Members of Council. I am Walter Brown, also known as Skip. I'm the Assistant Superintendent for Support Services and Planning for the Paradise Valley School District located in north Phoenix and North Scottsdale. My job entails buying land, building schools, feeding all the children and transportation and pupils' safety. My credentials are I've got a masters in management, a PhD in public administration, and the focus of my 66 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 dissertation was on pupil and transportation safety. That's probably why I'm selected for all these committees. I think I am the only crossing guard with a doctorate. I've had staff and supervisor responsibilities for student safety within the Paradise Valley Unified School District for years. 9 Additionally, I served on the Phoenix Safe 10 Schools Task Force and the City of Phoenix 11 Streets and Transportation Committee for the 12 last bond election. I make presentation to 13 national risk management associations like 14 PRIMA and the National Safety Council regarding student safety. I'll talk a bit about the Paradise Valley Unified School District. Paradise Valley is one of 46 districts in the metro Phoenix area. It's a little differently organized in here. We have over 300,000 students attending public, and even more in private and charter schools. Public schools districts in Arizona are separate governmental agencies from the cities and counties in which they are located. 67 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Consequently, there are constant challenges and opportunities with overlapping the jurisdictions and authorities. Our boundaries include about a 100 miles located in two different cities, Phoenix and Scottsdale. The district serves about 34,000 pre-K through 12th grade students using 44 schools sited in both urban as well as suburban areas. We have 84 crossing sites controlled by 97 crossing guards. Some sites have two guards because of the width of the street or density of the traffic. The problem we've had to deal with, like any major urban area, the streets of metro Phoenix are potentially very dangerous. According to the city there is one traffic fatality every 2.6 hours, one traffic crash every 14.8 minutes, one traffic injury every 22.3 minutes, one DUI-related collision every 3.5 hours, one bicyclist hit every 2.1 days and one pedestrian hit every two days. The district is located in one of the fastest growing areas in metro Phoenix, which in turn is one of the fastest growing 68 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 areas in the nation. We're developing about one acre an hour of desert. Miles of new street construction, unfamiliar streets, drivers bringing bad habits from all over the nation, ever-increasing traffic density and maniacs on our streets, which I think I've heard described here as well --

Do you have a lot of Philadelphia transplants out there?

I'm pretty sure there's nobody left in Chicago because I think they're all from there. By the way, we do boast the highest number of red light runners in the nation. We're not proud of it, but that's what we happen to have. This all presents a very real threat to students making their way to and from school every single day. Only 10,000 of our students are eligible for school bus transportation. The remaining 24,000 are driven by parents or drive themselves -- which is a whole different discussion -- or walk or ride their bicycles or their skateboards -- 69 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 shudder -- as much as a mile and a half to school each day. The task the community faces is to provide a safe environment for the students as they travel to and from school during the 180 school days we have, plus the summer sessions as well. That's kind of the environment we're working with. The strategies my district uses for safety is -- this is mostly for Paradise Valley, but this also has to do with the City of Phoenix because we partner with them pretty thoroughly. Like any complex issue, there is no single answer to school crossing safety. I'll divide the strategies into four major areas; environment, operations, equipment and training. The streets are designed for student and pedestrian safety in Phoenix. They look at them closely. One of Arizona's revised statutes established yellow crossing zones and the use of portable speed zone signs that are rolled out. This is in lieu of the flashing signs, so we're a little low tech, and the school district has to roll the signs in and 70 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 out. We don't have daylight savings in Arizona because we're backwards there, but the school district is responsible for bringing the signs in and bringing them out every day. The school districts must request for a school zone to be established, and once it's established, the school is responsible for manning that crossing site. Both the cities of Phoenix and Scottsdale have been very responsive to our need for student and pedestrian safe streets. They've posted traffic advisory signs before each crosswalk in fluorescent green and yellow, which you seen earlier, and they've also stenciled in the pavement large words like "school zones" before each crossing. That combined with the roll-out signs gives plenty of warning for the school zones as we get into them. Additionally, Phoenix has thought outside the box a bit and placed signs that are equipped with speed sensors in one of our most dangerous crossings. This is a very wide street that traverses east to west in Phoenix, comes off the freeway, and drivers generally 71 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 travel around 50 or so. We come to a mid-block crossing where the speed limit is 40. They're probably traveling closer to 50, and it drops to 15.

Do those sensor signs only activate during a specific time of the day when the students are arriving and dismissal?

In this particular case, they do. We give the crossing guards keys to turn those signs on and to turn those signs off, so part of their responsibility is to roll the signs out, plus turn that particular device on.

So they don't function, like, 24/7. Got you. Okay. Thank you.

The sign flashes while crossing. So you get a little bit of the flashing sign before you get to the intersection. It also displays the sign in a large, easy-to-read panel. And a strobe light, reminiscent of flash photography or photo radar, goes off as you exceed 15 miles 72 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 per hour. We thought about putting one that would show your speed, but then we thought the children in the area who were driving might decide to use that as a device to see how fast they can go through the speed zone. So we said at over we'll have it flash a strobe 8 light. 9 That crossing was probably the 10 single most dangerous in the city of Phoenix 11 in terms in of potentiality of student injury 12 and death. Traffic routinely sped through the 13 school zone. Traffic speed or passing 14 violations ceased to become a problem 15 immediately after this device was installed. The district is looking into installing similar signs on two other very busy streets. Phoenix is partnering with the district in some other innovative devices like crosswalks with flashing lights embedded in the street, advanced rumble stripes to crossings, and even built a pedestrian bridge. All of these efforts have had some measure of success, but none has been as effective as the sign with the strobe light and the speed 73 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 sensor I just mentioned. We carefully choose our locations of the schools. Whenever possible we locate elementary schools -- that's pre-kindergarten through 6th grade in my district -- in the middle of neighborhoods and well off arterial roads. We allow middle schools to abut feeder streets, but still avoid the major streets for our 7th and 8th graders. There are fewer pedestrians and bicyclists going to high schools so they are located on the major streets. We want to afford reasonable, safe ingress and access for student drivers and we want to keep them out of neighborhoods, frankly. About 10 years ago we began consider traffic and pedestrian safety when we designed new schools and renovated older ones. In our newer schools, the bus traffic is entirely separated from the parental pick-up traffic. The parental pick-up traffic, in turn, is entirely separated from bicycles and pedestrian traffic. In our older schools, we sometimes 74 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 don't have the space or the layout to physically separate the modes of transportation. Consequently, we will stagger school bus arrival/departure times or put out road cones or use paints to help get that same kind of effect. Attendance area boundaries are reviewed each year to ensure that new major arterial roads have not suddenly appeared. Once sleepy, backwater streets can become six-lane raceways almost overnight. We'll either modify boundaries so as to preclude children from crossing dangerous streets or provide them with the school bus service if modifying the boundaries isn't feasible. I've left a copy of the Arizona Department of Transportation's rules regarding traffic zones and specifications that we use in Arizona. The document outlines existing laws regarding yellow zones, use of roll-out signs and what kind of painted markings are used in Arizona. Laws and rules represent half the battle. The other half is enforcing them. 75 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Phoenix, like most cities, is short of police officers. We have some tools that help alleviate the shortage. We use photo radar and red light enforcement zones with cameras. In Scottsdale if they found the red light enforcement zone with the camera wasn't enough, they also put a speed sensor for that same thing so people who saw the light turn yellow didn't suddenly hit 50 or 60 trying to get through before the red light sensor would come on. So they get you both ways there in Scottsdale; they get you for speeding as you go through or running a red light if you should go through slowly.

It's still difficult to get officers to enforce some of the parking around our schools, which I think is probably a universal problem, and some of the jaywalking offenses commonly found around schools. Our building principals do their very best to enforce safety rules, but typically don't get many thanks for their efforts, as you well might imagine. Under operations, safety and 76 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 planning of the operations encompasses much of what I do. " The school 6 principals and I met and discussed methods of 7 improving pupil safety, particularly those 8 walking to school. 9 My biggest concern was the unmanned 10 crossing. Parents have a reasonable expectation that their child has a safe route to school. A five or six-year-old crossing the street unescorted is just an absolute recipe for disaster. We decided the most effective way to supervise the crossing guards was not at the district office where we were supervising, but that each individual school would supervise their own crossing sites, bringing the problem down to decentralizing the supervision of crossing guards. This was one of the best ideas we have implemented. The district still helps recruit and we still oversee training and we still check you, but the school supervises the guards. The school is much more able to respond if a crossing 77 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 guard is missing. I've seen plenty of principals with a vest and a stop paddle working what could have been a very dangerous crossing sight when a crossing guard unexpectedly does not show up for work. If you look in the trunk of my personal car, you will find a stop paddle and a vest, and I have also done that as well. Since we've shifted the responsibility to the buildings and the principals, I cannot remember the last time I had to report an unmanned crosswalk. Several other operational components of safety include coordinating with traffic engineers to develop a safe route to school. The city of Phoenix has been generous and has given us a young man that comes out and shows us the best way to walk to school. Taking that approach has been very useful, particularly as we start getting level three sex offenders registered and living in our district. We can then modify the safe route to schools so we're not walking them through potentially dangerous areas. Several schools sponsor a walk to 78 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 school day where parents are encouraged to take the time and walk the designated route with their children. This has also been very successful. We have two schools piloting an idea that we saw on television called the Walking School Bus where two adults walk along the route picking up kids at designated bus stops and then walking them to school. Again, this program is very well received and has the effect of having a built-in crossing guard at every single corner and traffic light and driveway. There are other techniques we use to enhance safety. Some we can do with coordination of the city of Phoenix and some we cannot. For example, there are several crossing sites on very wide roads. We simply assign two crossing guards to these sites. This doesn't require any additional coordination. There are other situations where we need wider sidewalks or queuing areas for the students to stand. Typically we can get pedestrian "stand back" lines painted on 79 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 sidewalks, traffic signal times lengthened for crossing during school times or focused traffic enforcement at a specific crosswalk with little more than a telephone call to the Police Department. The third area was equipment. We provide the typical equipment for our crossing guards. We have reflective garments. We do have a reflective hat that they can wear and we also produce a cold bandanna for our crossing guards. This is appreciated during the first and last few months of the school year, particularly in Arizona where it's starting to get pretty darn hot.

And wet weather gear, which is not used very much in the middle of our desert. We have on certain occasions provided our crossing guards with two-way radios. Typically this is so they can call for help in some of the rougher areas of town. The city provides them stop paddles. Phoenix provides the roll out signs, but Scottsdale does not. We have to buy those. Both cities are responsive in installing typical signage, though, no parking signs, the 80 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 ones that alert you that you're approaching a school crossing zone. All crossings have appropriate street lights for those winter early hours when students walk to school in darkness. Training is probably one of the single most important things and it's one of the most difficult things because we have a high turnover of crossing guards, and I think that's probably endemic nationwide. Again, the equipment is standard, but no matter how good or how complete the equipment is, the single most important component of the safety chain is the crossing guard. Their job description is pretty simple, be the adult at the crossing site. You're not allowed to direct traffic in Arizona. In my district our crossing guards are typically post-retired men and women who want to be involved with schools. The other largest group of our crossing guards are PTA moms who are paid volunteers or sometimes unpaid volunteers. Both groups are very reliable and very dependable. But they need 81 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 to be trained. They have to have the standardized training package throughout my district and throughout the state. They do a great job. I am always entertained just before winter break or at the end of the school year, the guards get so many presents and baked goods and pins and stuff, they can hardly get back in their cars. That's one of the benefits of having the guards associated with the school, so as they become involved with school activity and school functions they then become identified as members of the school district. It's critical that we train this dedicated and well-meaning group of people. Simply arming them with a paddle and a reflective vest puts them, the children and the motoring public at risk. We have a comprehensive training program that includes a professionally produced videotape -- and I've left copies. There will be one for the white crosswalks and one for the yellow zone crosswalks, and they have it in English and in 82 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Spanish. And we also have an annual refresher course. My district has provided an auditorium for the City of Phoenix to host this training for the past few years. Other governmental agencies, the county and Arizona Department of Transportation will conduct Train the Trainer seminars where we bring in experts in the field from as far away as Florida. My colleague to my right in fact has been there and did some of that training for us. So how do we know this program is working? You remember we have the mean streets of Phoenix. They certainly are. Here are the stats, just very briefly. The number of children struck while traveling to and from school during school hours from 1993 to present in my district is zero. Crossing guards struck in the line of duty during that same almost decade, we've had four of them struck; one eventually died from their injuries and one was unable to return. The last student fatality in the city of Phoenix I believe in a school crosswalk was in 2000 or 83 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 possibly 2001. I believe the most important element in an effective safety program is to continually evaluate the conditions and work on improvements for the program. The entire team, the crossing guards, the school administrators, streets department, law enforcement, parents, local businesses, have all got to be involved with this particular effort. It's our collective responsibility to provide a safe environment for all the children. That concludes my presentation.

Do you have any questions?

Thank you very much. Why don't we have your testimony and then we can come back and ask some questions. Please identify yourself for the record. You have to pull that microphone close to you.

I'm Leigh Matusick. I'm with the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, and I am the state's school crossing guard trainer 84 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 administrator. Florida is only state in the nation that has mandatory standardized training by law for their school crossing guards. Unfortunately, we just didn't think of it. It occurred by a tragic death in 1991 of a little boy named Ramon Turnquist (ph). He was on his way to school with his mom. There was a guard at the corner. The light had changed red. The guard told the child to come across the street, and a pick-up truck ran the red light and hit and killed Ramon Turnquist. There was such a public outcry by the Police Department, which we found was kind of odd because they had the crossing guard program within their unit. They thought that if they supplied some safety gear for the guard, told them to go to the corner and get the child across the street, there really wasn't a whole lot of science or a lot of knowledge that needed to go with that. They were surely mistaken. And they readily admitted it. Also we had the state legislation 85 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 and the school administrators calling for training for the school crossing guards, and for training in education of the students. I have presented at many state conferences around the United States and done training around the United States as well. I'm sorry to say still Florida is the only one in the United States with mandatory training, but we have been able, such as Phoenix, Boston, Detroit and some of the other larger cities, Seattle, Washington, to be able to have their cities come up with a program that will work for them. They are still in the process of making it mandatory for all children within the state. I also have been selected as an expert witness. I have served in numerous trials that have involved school crossing guards, as well as school crossings. Usually, I am sorry to say, it is also due to training that a lot of the deaths and the injuries have occurred -- or rather lack of training. 75 governs the mandatory training. In your packet, I 86 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 have supplied you a copy of the Florida state statute. I have supplied you a copy of our school crossing guard training guidelines, along with several of our forms that we do use in the state. Governor Jed Bush looks at this as a very important service to the community. In fact, the first Friday of every February is School Crossing Guard Appreciation Day. The governor issues a proclamation as well as three awards for the state; one for guard of the year, one for program of the year, and also one for trainer of the year. So it is an ongoing effort around the state. For the school crossing guards, they are required to have eight hours of training in their initial training; fours hour of classroom, two hours in the field at a simulated intersection or a real intersection without students, and then some time during that calendar year, a two-hour on-site observation at their post making sure they are still following the state guidelines. For the school crossing guard 87 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 trainer, which I do the training for the trainers, they have a two-day program, 4 hours. With that program there is also a lot 5 of in-the-field training, making sure they 6 understand how to do the crossing as a 7 crossing guard, as well as training and 8 instructing as a trainer. 9 In the training for the school 10 crossing guards, they go over visibility and 11 conspicuity, how to be seen, where to stand. 12 One of the unique things we found is even 13 though a lot of the crossing guards were 14 grandparents or parents, they didn't 15 understand how children think. Children are 16 not young adults. They think differently than we do. They lack traffic safety skills. They mix fantasy with reality. So all of these also are encompassed with the problems with traffic crashes.

They focus on one event or thought at a time. A child standing on the side of the road and their friend calls them across the street, do they stop and look left, right, left before crossing the street, or do they go straight over to their buddy? That's 88 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 what most important to them. So we have to make the guards as well as the public understand that children see things differently. Not only is school crossing guard training important to the public and the community, but supervision, accountability, record-keeping and daily monitoring is also critical. The school crossing guard program is one of the highest liability divisions within the law enforcement agency. If you place a school crossing guard at a particular intersection, it is public expectation that somebody will be there every day of the school year. School crossing guard posts cannot be left unattended for any reason. Whether it's the school crossing guard, a school substitute guard or the crossing guard supervisor or Police Department, someone must be at that post each and every day. Parents can't guess what day the post is going to be covered and what day the post is not. The motoring public also looks out for the school crossing guards and are known 89 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 in the crossing areas, and they learn to expect controlled activity of the students at these intersections. If the school crossing guard is not there, the children are likely to run into traffic and/or not wait for the traffic signals or the appropriate gaps in traffic. The purpose of the school crossing guard is also to assist and educate students on traffic behavior. We found in the State of Florida that from K to 12th grade, children are only given about one dollar's worth of traffic safety education in the school system. That's K through 12. But if they don't have that traffic safety education going to and from school and Saturdays, Sundays, holidays and weekends, they're not going to be in school Monday morning to learn reading, math. More so, they may be so severely injured that they may still physically be alive, but not mentally alive where education wouldn't benefit them anyway. In order for the school crossing guard program to work efficiently there must 90 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 be full commitment and support of the entire police community, along with the City governments to provide support, training, proper road signage and pavement markings. It's also important to have money to fund these programs, as well as funding for training and equipment. This program is an investment in the children of our future and the residents of our cities. The State of Florida is not only committed to the children in the State of Florida, but children across the nation. We as the State of Florida gladly will assist your Police Department, Public Works, City governments any possible way that we can help create the aspects of the Safe Routes to School and to make your children safe as well. I thank you for the opportunity to also be here. My background is law enforcement. I've been doing the school crossing guard program since 1984 and have been with the state now 14 years. So I'll be glad to answer any questions on school crossing guard training, hiring practices and 91 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 so on.

Thank you very much for your testimony. First, Dr. Brown, are there specific design standards for either new or refurbished elementary schools or high schools as it relates to pedestrian safety issues? Are there design requirements?

There are no design requirements. There's a group called Safety (ph), which is a national school design association, and they'd be the ones to publish such a thing as that. But I think because the schools are so different nationwide there's been no standard established. I brought this to the table prior to becoming the guy in charge of building and designing the schools. I was also involved with pupil transportation. And I brought an aspect that typically doesn't come along, and that is probably fairly unique to our district. We provided prototypical designs to other schools in the districts throughout Phoenix and people like the idea when you 92 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 finally say it to them. They go, well, yeah, that's a great idea. But in answer to your question, there is no specific design minimum standards or even guidelines.

One of the opportunities that we have here in Philadelphia is that Paul Vallas, our superintendent, is embarking on a large-scale new construction program for high schools and a large-scale renovation program for our elementary schools. And I'm wondering whether or not there were some standards that maybe he could roll into the design requirements for both the new schools and for the refurbished schools to maybe give us some ability at this point to change some of the structure of the schools relative to bus drop-off, parent pick-up, especially in urban areas. I know in suburban areas you have the large parking lots and you can do different things. When you're in a local elementary school or high school that's in the middle of a city, it's hard to redesign. Most 93 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 of our schools are 50, 60, 80 years old and were designed when people didn't drive at all. You said you could recommend --

I could see if I could find if there is such a thing. I know the headquarters for that particular organization is in Scottsdale. I'll make a visit and see if they've gotten any base standards. I can report them back.

Thank you very much. We're going to hear a little bit later from people in the City and we're going to discuss -- I'm not even aware in the City right now what the training requirements are for crossing guards and how much ongoing training they receive once hired. It kind of shocked me a little bit, I guess, the fact that the State of Florida has a person that does nothing but dealing with crossing guards and crossing guard standards and training. It's amazing. I know there's not one in the State of Pennsylvania. Certainly there's an office here in the City, but I don't think 94 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 it's as extensive as what you've talked about. How do you become a crossing guard in Florida?

Ninety-three percent of all the school crossing guard programs in the State of Florida are run out of local law enforcement agencies. There's different types of hiring practices as well as notifying people. Everybody usually thinks the norm of the newspaper. With that comes different types of people, different people looking for different types of work. So from there you really need to start targeting the areas that you need the school crossing guards. One of the best places to look at is at churches. All people usually go to a church within their community. Work with the church, have a little bulletin put in the church bulletin, have somebody come and speak. I think there's a misconception of what school crossing guards are. Most people don't even know they get paid, and they don't know how they get there or why they're really even there. So by somebody going out 95 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 publicly, which takes a little bit of time because it's usually after the normal working hours, but hitting the PTAs, going to your rotary clubs, going to any kind of civic organizations and let them know that you are having a problem or needing guards. Another place that we really found effective in finding part-time people was through our city newsletter. We put it in the paychecks and just said we were looking for part-time people. We found those people usually stayed because their spouse had the full-time paying job and they want to do an excellent job, even part-time, so it wouldn't interfere. So there's a lot of avenues that you could look at. You just have to be a little more creative. With that, though, comes the hiring --

This is a very loud City. Sometimes I think it's louder than New York. This is just a regular occurrence.

With that also comes some different perspectives with hiring. The 96 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 most important, making sure that you do background checks on the people that you hire even though they're part-time. Workman's comp issues, making sure that they're physically fit. I live in Florida where we don't have snow, but here in the winters, they're standing out in the cold and in the summer and spring. We're making sure they're physically fit. We do a little hearing test and eye test because you wouldn't want a hearing impaired or a sight impaired crossing guard. If you don't put those parameters in place prior as a requirement for hiring, you're going to have issues with that as well.

When it comes to equipment, standardized equipment as far as clothing, reflective clothing, paddles, radio, is there a standard developed as well or in areas of standardized equipment? In Florida they require equipment for all guards?

Reflective vests, a stop paddle and/or fluorescent gloves and a whistle. But the agencies are more than welcome to uniform their guards above that. 97 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 If there is no uniform in process, they need to have strict dress codes. You don't want somebody standing on the corner with a shirt with a beer logo or tobacco logo. Again, as a public image, these people are your employees, and they have to reflect positively. The whistle isn't used each and every time, but it's more of an emergency audio device if the guard is in the roadway.

Do you find that the paddle is effective? Sometimes I'll see a guard with paddles. A lot of times we don't. I was just curious as to how effective the paddle is in traffic calming or in notification that there's an intersection there.

Well, the MUTCD, the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices requires anybody working in the roadway must have at least an 18-inch paddle with a six-inch lettering. They can either be metal or they can be some sort of plastic. Florida is the lightning capital of the world. We don't suggest the metal paddles, as we don't 98 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 want the guards to be lightning rods. They have enough trouble with traffic without adding the lightning as well. But we find for older people even though they are effective, sometimes with the wind, it tends to blow their wrists back. I think they're more effective. A lot of guards like to have both hands free in case of something. That's why we require the fluorescent gloves so at least when they're out there, they're not bare handed. Skip.

Our requirement is simply a reflective vest and the paddle and we tend to also go with the plastic paddles for lightness. And then from time to time our guards, like everybody else, have a little road rage. So should they happen to whack a car, I'd rather have them whack it with a plastic paddle than a metal one, that's for sure.

How about Phoenix's minimum training requirements?

Well, there's no 99 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 formalized minimum training requirements. As Leigh said, there's none in the state. We're kind of backed into it by saying, what can we do, and what needs to be a minimum. And the minimum, we have the videotapes that I left a copy of. This is produced by one of our local news anchors. It's professional. It's not a just a talking head type of thing. The thing shows pictures and so on. That gives us a standardized training for every single guard. And it's very important to have something that you can do more than simply once a year because the guards tend to turn over rather rapidly. At least we have a high turbulence. And so before someone goes out be a guard, whether it's a building principal, a custodian or a new hire, then you see the tape just to make sure they don't put the signs out wrong and do it incorrectly. Then annually, we host a city-wide crossing guard forum. And that's a delightful three-hour period of time where they have a chance to talk to law enforcement, the streets, as well as get whatever the updates are. And they tend to 100 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 get free gimmies like reflective hats and things like that. We'll do Train the Trainers. We're about to do another large Train the Trainer throughout the metro Phoenix area. That will be coming up next month. That's being run by something called Maricopa Association of Governments, Maricopa County, which is overlaying all the messes of municipalities we've got. So those are the three things we primarily do.

What in Florida and in Phoenix, what kind of cooperation do you get from law enforcement when it comes to the enforcement of speed limitations in school zones? Is it an aggressive, zero-tolerance type of operation or do you find it hit and miss?

In Scottsdale, in fact, it's very, very tightly enforced. I think through the whole metro Phoenix area actually. You'd be likely to get a ticket. The ticket's fine is $110 and two points on your traffic record. If we don't have enough officers -- and we typically don't -- they've got some 101 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 mobile photo radar units that they can bring out to a troublesome crossing. And in Scottsdale they have vans that actually drive around to these different places or we can get motor policemen. So they've been very responsive to us and it really works quite well.

And in Florida?

We have a little different set-up as far as law enforcement hierarchy than you do here in Pennsylvania. We have city police officers, but our city police officers handle everything in the city, including traffic, running radar, writing tickets, traffic homicide as well. Our county sheriff's office is the law office in the unincorporated areas of the county. And then our State Police are mainly state highway patrol where they only do traffic on our state roads and our inner state. So it's a little bit different. But, yes, the cities as well as the counties actively target those school crossing areas. Most every city and county has big 102 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 blitzes right in the beginning of school reminding people that might have forgotten that schools are in session. And they write tickets. Florida also has doubled the fine for a speeding violation in legally posted school zones. If you're caught going 30 or above it's a minimum $500 fine base ticket, not counting court costs and points on the license as well. So it is taken very seriously. Also, Florida for their normal speed laws, zero to five miles an hour over a posted speed is a mandatory warning, not in a school zone. A school zone is the only type of speed zone that has a mandatory citation with it, with no warnings at all.

Well, I don't have any other questions. I want to thank you for taking the time to come in. It was a very, very terrific presentation. It was very enlightening and we appreciate your contribution to helping us solve our problem. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Also, in 103 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 your packet -- and I think Jennifer was kind of talking about it too -- things also to help the children that the state does. We were talking about give-aways in education. And I've supplied you with some blinking lights that let the kids be seen, the slap bracelets, even though they're fun, gives them the fluorescent and retro reflective. So it's a whole conglomeration with that as well. And there's some other samples in there.

I assume that all your traffic signs in the school zones are all yellow-green fluorescent, not just the flat --

The yellow-black? We're in the process -- the MUTCD, the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, the 2000 version just made that as far as the yellow-green is acceptable with the yellow-black. So the state didn't go around and change them all to the yellow-black. We are in the process of changing them. But all of Section 7 governs school crossing guard signage. The State of Florida has a mandate 104 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 for how all school zones are supposed to be marked, whether it's at a signalized intersection, a stop sign mid block, a regular type of crossing. And that is part of the training because the crossing guards are there every day and they go in and out of the school zones, so it's important that they know how they're supposed to be marked. So if there are any problems, then the crossing guards can report that as well as the supervisors who should be out there daily making sure the guards are on post.

Thanks again for your testimony. Mr. Goldsmith, I saw him leave the room earlier. If there's someone representing him. If not, is Commissioner Tolson or someone from the Streets Department here? And Dexter Green. Is there anyone from the Philadelphia Police Department here? (No response.) COMMISSIONER TOLSON: Good 105 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 afternoon. My name is Clarena Tolson, Commissioner of the Philadelphia Streets Department. Managing Director Goldsmith is on his way. He's returning.

Please proceed. COMMISSIONER TOLSON: I welcome the opportunity to testify about the safety of children going to and from school. The Streets Department is a committed partner in providing a safe route to school. Static school speed limit signs are erected on streets abutting schools. Since 1996, school flashing signal devices have been installed at 155 schools, in Calendar 2003. 16 We have begun laying out school flasher 17 locations under an FY' 2004 contract for 18 $342,000. We expect this contract to install 19 school flashers at about 15 schools. As an 20 innovation to maximize the use of City 21 dollars, the Department is now including 22 school flashers on federally funded 23 improvement projects. Three schools have had new flasher signals installed as part of an Ogontz Avenue project. 106 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Designated school crossings are signed in accordance with state regulations and crosswalks are marked with the continental zebra pattern. Continental crosswalks are also placed across controlled streets in a school block. As a member of the Managing Director's School Safety Task Force, the Department is conducting an inspection of the signage and markings at more than 1,000 designated school crossings. As of April 15, 944 crossings have been checked, and 736 signed work orders issued. Signs at 208 locations were satisfactory. Work has been completed on 257 of them. If one school crossing sign needs to be replaced, we're replacing all the school crossing signs with the fluorescent yellow-green signs. Work orders also have been issued to remark continental crosswalks at intersections. Crosswalks at 919 22 crossings were satisfactory. 23 At the request of the Managing 24 Director's School Safety Task Force, the 25 School District conducted a parking sign 107 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 survey. The Department's Traffic Engineering Division is reviewing them for needed signage. In the past, parking during school hours was prohibited from streets abutting a school. This was done to combat dart-out crashes by providing additional visibility to both child and vehicle. The School District's Safety Office is reviewing loading and parking needs at the schools. The Department will review these recommendations, with our primary emphasis being student safety during arrival and dismissal. Loading and/or parking may be permitted on the side of schools that do not have direct access to the building or the property. The safety of our children and our students is a responsibility of all of us, and the Streets Department will continue to work with all to provide save streets. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Chief, could you give your testimony?

Thank you, Councilman. 108 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Good afternoon.

I'm sorry. Just for the record, you need to identify yourself.

My name is Dexter Green. I'm the Chief Safety Executive for the School District of Philadelphia. Child pedestrian injuries are frequently serious and often deadly. Nationwide pedestrian injuries remains the second leading cause of unintentional injury and related death among children five to 14. Children have difficulty judging how fast cars are moving, how far away they are and which direction traffic sounds are coming from. They have trouble recognizing and reacting to danger, which you heard earlier today. Most children are struck in streets or driveways near their homes when darting out between parked cars, crossing in the middle of the block or at other non-intersection locations. Other children dart out between cars parked illegally around schools. Tragically, many of our victims are victims of speeding and irresponsible drivers. To date there have 109 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 been 70 children pedestrian accidents since the beginning of this school year. The School District of Philadelphia takes very seriously the safety and security of our students. As such, the District has implemented the following safety initiatives aimed at increasing awareness of traffic and bus safety and protecting our students from future incidents. Safe Corridors is one of the programs the District has taken on. This initiative recruits parents and community members to volunteer to create safe routes to and from school for students. Dozens of volunteers this year have received training and equipment, including vests, walkie-talkies and other identifying apparel from the School District of Philadelphia. A new program is the Walking Bus Safety Program, which we're bringing here to Philadelphia. Every school administrator has been asked to identify a safe and heavily traveled route to and from school and to make the route part of the official school safety 110 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 plan. Every child and parent/guardian has received a Safe Corridors Tip brochure, which was produced by the School District of Philadelphia, which advises them on safety involving travel, bus and traffic safety. The School District works in conjunction with the City of Philadelphia, and in particular the Managing Director's Office, the Philadelphia Police Department, Streets, Licenses and Inspections and the Traffic Engineer's Office is working as a task force to develop strategies to promote pedestrian safety. The School District's multi-agency partnership includes, as I said, the Police Department and their school crossing guards, law enforcement and also the highway flashing lights in front of our schools. The School District provided for the first time last summer, provided funding for summer school, which had never been done before, for school crossing guards. Mr. Goldsmith is not in the room yet. We haven't paid the bill, but we intend to do that very 111 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 soon.

Consider yourself the Gas Works. You don't have to pay us anything. Consider yourself PGW.

No. The money is in my budget and we're going to take care of that. We're also going to do that program again this summer, for this year's summer school. Safety is incorporated in the school's curriculum. We have a wristwatch program which talks about bike safety, pedestrian safety, fire safety and some other issues. School police officers and our school mobile patrols patrol around our schools during arrival and dismissal times. In addition, there are an other strategies that the School District is exploring to address child pedestrian safety, including developing a partnership with Triple A and the Department of Transportation. The CEO, Paul Vallas, has committed to contributing $1 million to the City of Philadelphia for the flashing lights near and around public and charter schools. We will 112 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 continue also to look for and secure other grant funding for additional flashing lights, if needed, or to create safe school zones, and grants for conducting engineering studies to improve pedestrian safety near and around our schools. Increasing school participation in implementing educational programs and events, i.e., "Walk Our Children to School Week" and other safety campaigns, safety book covers and coloring books will be provided. Training for parents -- and this is essential for us -- training of parent volunteers to teach young children the basic pedestrian skills that will enable them to better handle a variety of traffic situations in a flexible way. Finally, requesting an increase in law enforcement and traffic enforcement in and around our schools, and that has been part of our dialog in the Managing Director's Office. The District thanks you for the opportunity to present here today and we thank the Council for its continued support.

Thank you. 113 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 Managing Director, would you like to give your testimony, and then we'll have some questions?

Thank you for indulging me for leaving.

I know you're busy.

Good afternoon. My name is Phil Goldsmith, Managing Director for the City of Philadelphia. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to explain what the City is doing to ensure the safety of our children as they walk to and from school. I want to thank you, Councilman Kenney, for chairing this. And I found a lot of comments I heard earlier very informative. When the Daily News recently raised concerns about students being struck by cars as they walk to and from schools, they found that the responsibility for the safety of children was divided, and that there was a lack of coordination among those who shared that responsibility. As a result, the safety of children walking to and from school was not 114 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 receiving the focus and attention that it deserved. In response to these concerns, I convened a School Safety Zone Task Force to assess student pedestrian safety throughout the City. The tasks force is composed of representatives from the Police and Street Departments, the City Planning Commission, the School District, the Mayor's Office, the Archdiocese, Traffic Court, and recently the Parking Authority. I authorized the task force to take immediate corrective action where appropriate and to recommend strategies to enhance the safety of children walking to and from school through a combination of initiatives. It was interesting listening to Jennifer Toole talk. I think our approach is similar to what she was articulating, which I would say is a balanced approach. Number one is new traffic engineering measures. Number two is pedestrian safety education for children -- and I might add parents because I think we can never lose sight of the fact of 115 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 parental responsibility -- and three law enforcement strategies. Since being convened in November 2003, which I would say is actually before the publication of the Daily News article, though we knew it was going to run, the task force has taken a number of steps, including taking immediate corrective action where appropriate, such as reassigning an underutilized school crossing guard to a higher need crossing location near the Forrest Elementary School within a matter of days of that matter being brought to our attention. I recently earlier this morning, I asked the Streets Department to take a look at the Franklin Town Charter School area where a child was injured yesterday, and have asked them to report back to me next week as to what steps we have to take there. We directed the Streets Department to conduct a comprehensive safety audit of more than 1,000 school crossing sites to ensure that all traffic control devices are installed properly and are functioning. Let me report that as of April 116 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 15th, 944 crossing sites have been checked, generating 736 work orders. All work orders generated by this audit should be completed by the beginning of the new school year. As the Streets Department completes the safety audit, they will replace missing or damaged older style yellow school crossing guards with more visible fluorescent signs. Again, those were mentioned in the slide show and we have some in place. I hope you've had the opportunity to see them. Eventually, all of the older style yellow signs will be phased out in favor of the new more visible signs. The Streets Department will also replace worn or install new, white continental crosswalks at school crossing sites as needed. The task force also asked the Streets Department to conduct an analysis of parking surveys completed by every public school at the request of the task force. Once the Streets Department completes its analysis of the parking surveys, they will make appropriate changes in parking around schools to enhance pedestrian safety at arrival and 117 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 dismissal times.

At the request of the task force, the Police Department has implemented a progressive enforcement plan to address law enforcement of speeding and other traffic violations in school zones. This enforcement plan will initially target schools with priority enforcement needs as identified jointly by the School District and the Police Department. The Police Department will also take advantage of opportunities as it has to partner with the State Police whenever possible to enforce school speed limits at priority locations with radar guns, which can only be used by State Police under state law. At the request of the task force, the District has required all public schools to prepare a safe routes to school plan for students and parents. These plans have been submitted to the School District's Office of School Climate and Safety for approval. Approved plans will be distributed this spring to students and families. Also at the request of the task 118 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 force, the District is directing all schools to revise their School Safety Plans for the year 2004-2005 to include an educational component for auto and pedestrian safety. In addition, schools will be required to develop pick-up and drop-off plans designed to improve traffic safety in school zones. Students and parents should be educated about safety procedures for walking and driving to and from school. Early in the school year flashing lights at public schools were reprogrammed to coincide with the hours of the new after-school and extended day programs. They will be reprogrammed again at the end of the school year to coincide with the extended year programs. I've also asked the task force to determine how many crossing guards we need throughout the City and to establish criteria for their deployment. I've asked them to complete their analysis within 30 days so that their recommendations will be available for review within the current budget process. At the request of the Traffic Court, 119 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 we've also added a section to tickets to label whether the accident occurred in a school zone, and police have been asked to add a field in its accident report to include the age of a pedestrian involved in an automobile pedestrian accident. Finally, the task force is exploring different legislative strategies to enforce enforcement measures. Number one, we believe our police should be able to use radar in school zones. We do not understand why our police should be unarmed when it comes to protecting the safety of our school children. Two, we believe that school zones, just like construction work areas, should be singled out for additional penalties when people get caught speeding or in accidents. And three, we believe that when it comes to double parking or illegal parking around our schools, the fines should be doubled. As the task force completes its work over the coming months, we must remember that 120 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 the safety of children is a shared responsibility. That responsibility is shared by crossing guards, the police, traffic engineers, schools, parents, people who drive throughout our City, as well as the children themselves. With the right combination of traffic engineering measures, enforcement and educational efforts we hope to change the conditions and attitudes that have left too many of our children injured or even killed by automobile pedestrian accidents. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the Daily News, which I don't often do, for highlighting this important issue and helping to define the problem, and even suggesting some solutions. As part of their continuing coverage, I would like to see the Daily News publish the names of the drivers who were caught putting our children at risk as they walk to and from school. If we're going to publish the pictures of johns, I think it also makes sense to publish the names of those that are caught speeding in our school zone areas.

121 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 So we will continue our work as a task force. I want to thank all the members of the task force and the cooperation that we're getting and hopefully the progress that we will be making in the months and year ahead. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Managing Director Goldsmith and perhaps even Dexter Green could answer maybe from your experience as a high-ranking police official, it's my anecdotal information -- and I've heard it from other places before, not just experience -- is that probably the least busy time of the day for our police officers crime-wise is that early morning hour, 7:00 to 9:00, 10:00. Do you find that in your experience to be accurate, that it's usually late night times that are more priority call times as opposed to an 8:00 in the morning type of time frame?

When it comes to priority calls, that's probably true. But 122 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 there are other calls that I think that sometimes officers need to respond to. So when they're assigned, quite often when they're assigned a school crossing, if a call comes out, they're required to take those calls.

My thought is not assigning the officer to the school crossing, but to have the officer in a marked police car in the school area while the crossing guards are doing their work, they could then be dispatched on a priority or non-priority call and leave the scene at that particular point, but they'd be in a car. I guess, though, is that part of the enforcement is there's not much visibility within the school zones. We're only talking about a time frame usually about quarter to 8:00 to perhaps quarter to 9:00. It's only an hour time frame both in the morning and in the afternoon when they're getting out. In addition to the pedestrian safety issues, there's lots of stuff that goes on around schools that we would like to get a 123 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 handle on, and that's strange guys in cars, kids selling and buying drugs, fights potentially after there. So wouldn't it behoove us at some point to be able to within our districts have those marked vehicles assigned there on-call for other business, but in the area of the schools during the morning and dismissal times? It doesn't seem to me to be that -- again, there may be other reasons why we can't do it, but it seems it would cover a lot of bases.

I think one of the things that we do know is that we do know that schools open at a certain time and close at a certain time. I might say the task force has gone through a certain amount of discussion and debate among ourselves, for example, with the flashing lights, as to when they should be on or off. There are some that believe they should be on all the time because schools are a magnet for activity, whether it be recreational activities or --

Basketball practice. 124 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

Whatever. I would say when it comes to police, this is an issue we're dealing with the police. And I would say that we've got over 400 schools in this City when you throw in the charter schools and parochial schools and so forth. I know we don't have the manpower to specifically do precisely what you're suggesting. But I think conceptually there's more that we can do. We will be looking at it from a deployment perspective.

I guess even if you looked at to percent of our more 15 dangerous, highly traveled, higher speed 16 areas. I'm sure there's some elementary 17 schools in neighborhoods that don't experience 18 that kind of traffic. But there are other 19 areas, Wayne Avenue or Germantown Avenue or 20 Broad Street or wherever, there's a lot of 21 traffic and a lot of volume and a lot of 22 speed. I just think that police presence for 23 that 45-minute to an hour period twice a day 24 would calm a lot of people. 25 You know, you look at your 125 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 speedometer sometimes as soon as you see a police car, especially on the turnpike. I always have to check my speedometer if I see them up ahead. But I just -- and I also understand that officers feel -- some officers feel that being assigned actual crossing guard duty is kind of degrading and beneath them. I don't agree with them, but I think they often feel that's not something they want to be doing. So I guess if they're assigned to be in their car on call and could respond to anything during the course of that time, I'd appreciate you looking at that.

I should say we're also working with the Parking Authority to really get their help and assistance in the issue of illegal parking, double parking around schools and so forth. I think you're going to see us being much more stringent on those issues.

That's going to be the battle, I'll tell you right now. It's going to be the battle with the public, at least with the parents. We couldn't get 126 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 people to move their cars to sweep their streets. We had to abandon the program. Frank DiCicco had an opponent in last year's election because he had the audacity to try to sweep their streets and ask them to move their cars or they would be ticketed, so he winds up with an opponent, who's one of his issues is based on ticketing for street sweeping, which the most bizarre thing I've ever heard. What I'm concerned about is that elected officials like ourselves, once that initial torrent starts -- again, the issue with the Parking Authority is they usually don't start until about 9:30, 10:00 in the metered areas because I think that's when the enforcement begins. If you were to get them out there maybe a bit earlier in the school zones in the areas where they're servicing and they start writing a reasonable amount of tickets early on, we're going to get a raft of complaints. But if we weather that, I think that behavior gets modified.

I agree. Unless we show people that we're serious about 127 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 enforcement, then we're just whistling Dixie. And I would say there's differences between ticketing someone so you can clean the street and ticketing someone so you can protect a child. I think they're two different issues. But we are working with the Parking Authority and we'll see what they can do in terms of their timing.

Commissioner Tolson, there was discussion earlier of speed bumps, speed tables, rumble strips, has the Department looked at any of those things? Does PennDOT have an opinion on them? Is there something that could done in that area? COMMISSIONER TOLSON: There's certainly regulations and guidelines that we have to be governed by. However, I think the Department is trying to take a new look at the whole notion of slowing down the City and making the streets safer. So we are reexamining the issue on use of speed bumps or humps in the City. We have a couple of applications that we're testing out with soft rumble strips. 128 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

What are they? COMMISSIONER TOLSON: They're a plastic bubble applied to the street. They don't provide the same vibration that was talked about earlier, what you see at the turnpike, as you mentioned earlier today. We're testing that in, I think, two locations around the City to see if we can get traffic to slow down a little bit and also to examine how the neighboring houses respond to their use. So we will be progressive in our action and looking at all alternatives to slow the City down.

When it comes to the equipping of crossing guards, uniform, reflective gear, safety equipment, paddles, which I don't see too much of, have we kind of looked over how we equip our guards? I know a lot of our guards have been guards for many, many years and kind of have their own style -- general uniform -- but their own style of wearing it and what's worn when and what time of the year. Again, it's a very difficult job. It's very dangerous, and it's very cold 129 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 and it's very hot and very wet when it rains. There's various issues. But is there any look at standardizing both the uniform and guard equipment?

I do not know the answer to that. Lieutenant Cummings is here --

He's up next.

He may know that answer.

Education issues relative to the School District. It was testified to earlier, I think, that some districts that don't pay attention to this as much as -- we look like we're paying attention to it now -- may wind up with one hour of pedestrian crossing training for students K to 12th grade, period. When I remember growing up -- and I'm sure all of us do -- all the amount of fire safety training that we get and nowadays stranger safety training that children get. Is there any discussion within the District or within the task force to really expand the amount of in-school 130 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 instructions children get on how to traverse to and from and traffic rules and regulations and the like?

I think one of our shortcomings -- we have the Wristwatch Programs in the K to 8th grades, which talks, as I said before, about bike safety, pedestrian safety, bus safety, fire safety. One of the problems and one of the things that I think we're trying to correct on our end is knowing what safety programs are in each of the -- particularly the elementary schools. And we haven't successfully completed that. One of the things we'd like to do is find out first what programs are in what schools and then look at the best programs. And as someone said earlier, there are a lot of programs you can take right off the shelf. Triple A has a program out. PennDOT has a program out that we can take right off the shelf and put in our schools. Mr. Vallas has asked us to take a real serious look at that, and again, he's willing to come up with the dollars to get it done. 131 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

That would include, I guess, the software for computer programs that children could interact with?

Absolutely. Yes.

I know we've always done for years fire drills. I'm wondering whether or not on a smaller class-by-class basis there's some way to do kind of safety drills as it relates to crossing street crossings and the like. So maybe that is something you could also look at in getting kids physically on the scene to show them what some of the hazards and issues are relative to getting home and getting to school.

We'll explore that.

I want to thank you for your work and the task force. I want to thank you for coming in today and for your patience. I wanted to get some of our national people on so we had a framework. And I do appreciate your coming in. We intend to as a Committee issue some recommendations also and hopefully they will be able to mesh and 132 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 coincide with what you're doing. Representative from the Police Department and Betty McDonald. After that we'll have Roxanne Galeota and Sean McAleer. They'll be our last two witnesses. Please identify yourself.

Eugene Cummings, Philadelphia Police Department.

Please proceed.

I don't have any formal testimony. I'm sorry.

Okay. But you've been listening to testimony here today relative to -- I guess your area is the hiring, training, staffing of corners?

Not exactly. But I represent the Deputy Commissioner for Operations, Deputy Commissioner Fox. She's regrets that she's not able to attend, but she empowered me to provide you some answers or to get the answers for you.

Well, if there's anything you've heard either from a question 133 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 standpoint or from a testimony standpoint that you would like to respond to, fine. If you're not prepared to respond, it's not an issue because you probably weren't told to be prepared. So if there's something you'd like to just add to the record as a result of what you've heard, that would be fine.

With relationship to the school crossing guard training?

Yes, sir.

The Department provides a four-hour training block for each new guard and then from time to time the School Crossing Guard Unit provides additional training as needed or if there's some deficiencies found with some of the guards. The supervisor of the School Crossing Guard Unit provides some on-the-job training, so to speak.

What does the four hours of training entail?

It entails an overview of Police Department procedures, chain of command routines, traffic safety as 134 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 well as a practicum out on the street where the supervisor of the Guard Unit actually takes a new guard applicant and provides them some on-the-street training. I believe they use the intersection at 22nd and Walnut Streets.

That's the intersection that you use traditionally?

Yes, sir.

Is there a school there?

Yes, sir.

The school is actually at 22nd and Chestnut, between Chestnut and Walnut.

You have to identify yourself for the record.

I'm sorry. Betty McDonald, President of Local 1956. School crossing guard for years. 22 We have used 22nd and Walnut and 23 22nd and Chestnut, and I go with them.

You go with them? 135 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

Yes, I do. In fact I should be there today.

What is your opinion on the training and what you've heard about other jurisdictions and the amount of training that they provide, not only initially, but ongoing as the guards are working throughout the course of the year?

Officer Gail Braxton at headquarters is quite good. We work together. I do orientation before she begins when they are hired. I give them my expertise of years on the corner. They know the do's 15 and the don'ts. And then after Officer 16 Braxton is in the office for four hours, we go 17 out to 22nd and Walnut, and the last time we 18 did 22nd and Chestnut and Walnut because we 19 had about six guards. 20

I was wondering 21 whether or not there's been any discussion of 22 maybe changing up some of the orientation 23 corners to areas that maybe have a little more traffic volume or that maybe serve one or two schools as opposed to one just down the 136 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 street? How long ago was that corner selected as the practicum corner?

It's been a couple of years, as far as I know.

As long as I've been doing it, it's been there. That's the same one, yes.

What's your view on the equipment and uniform and other issues and other items that are issued to guards and the upgrade and upkeep of that equipment and the use of paddles?

Well, the use in paddles is difficult. I came on in '73 and we were prohibited from using them at that time. Under Corporal Tom Graham, he had 500 donated. Just as I was going out in '95 I got one. It's difficult to use one if you've worked 20 years without one. But I did try it for a 21 day. A lot of guards like them. They have to 22 buy their own. 23

They have to buy their own?

Yes. 137 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

How about issues like reflective gloves, reflective vests?

They wear reflective vests.

Is it a requirement, because I do in my own travels see people that don't have them on.

Each guard has a vest and has a clothing issue as well.

Is there any supervision as to whether it's used or whether it's worn?

Well, practically speaking, in addition to the Crossing Guard Unit, the district supervisors are to make spot checks of the individual guards to make sure they're wearing the appropriate uniform.

I know it's a tough job, so sometimes you have to call in sick or injured, what's the process of calling in that day when you're not going to show up or you can't make it or you're ill? And what happens as a result of that corner being vacated for a day or for a week? 138 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

The individual guard is expected to contact the district where they work and indicate the reason for their absence from work. And then a decision is made based upon the traffic at the particular area by the district supervisor to determine whether or not a police officer should in fact go there to try and cover that.

But there's no 11 specific policy as to the coverage of the corner, other than someone making a judgement call?

The guard must call an hour before she's going to be off.

Okay. That's a contract issue?

It's in the manual.

Because I'm wondering whether or not maybe some additional time prior to that hour might give the district supervisor commanders the ability to make other arrangements rather than leave the corner empty. That's just a suggestion.

It would be very 139 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 difficult if you woke up in the morning and were sick to give you more notice if you weren't sick the night before.

What happens with longer-term illness? The guard is out for some other injury that you know the person is going to be out a week, days, two weeks? 9 What happens then? 10

The district commander will evaluate that area. Sometimes in some cases he may redeploy a guard from what may be a less busier area to a busier corner, as that instance might be. And that's done on a frequent basis, but at sometimes there are temporary replacements that are put into those corners.

Who in your unit is involved with the task force?

Not me.

Not you?

No. And I want to thank you for having me here today. You kept your word.

You're always 140 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 welcome here.

No. I was supposed to be called for the task force, but as of this hearing I have not.

Anybody from your unit in the Department?

Deputy Commissioner Fox and Inspector Rebstock.

They are members of the task force?

Yes, sir.

Unless there's anything else you'd like to add, I will thank you for coming in and thank you for your input and testimony. If there's any recommendations that Deputy Commissioner Fox would like to make to the Committee in writing, or anything Betty, that your Local would like to make part of the record in writing, we'd be happy to take and make part of our report recommendations.

Anything that would protect the children of the City of Philadelphia we will welcome. 141 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

But I know you guys are out there on the street --

Every day.

-- and you know. So anything you guys want to put together for our consideration as a joint Committee for our end report we'd be happy to try to include.

I thank you. Many thanks.

Thank you very much. Have a nice day. Roxanne Galeota and Sean McAleer, please. Thank you for your patience. Please identify yourself for the record.

I'm Roxanne Galeota. I live at 718 Pemberton Street in Bella Vista, and I have my daughter Raquel Smith, with me.

Please proceed.

As I said, I'm a long-time resident of Bella Vista. I walk my daughter to school every single day. The reason I asked to testify is because for three years since she was in first grade we've been 142 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 attempting to make the route to school safer for her and scores of other kids.

What school does she attend?

She goes to Meredith School. Meredith School is located at Fifth and Fitzwater. We brought a map that shows our route to school. We've made copies. 10 The problem street is Passyunk Avenue at Fitzwater.

A problem street and a problem to pronounce too. I live next to Passyunk Avenue, so I know. I'm sorry. Go on.

Well, the problem is that we have no place to cross without dodging between parked cars in order to get to the crossing guard at Fifth and Fitzwater Streets. Every day scores of children go to school along Fitzwater Street and even more children are crossed back after school with their after-school programs. There must be about four or five programs that walk their children west of Meredith School. 143 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

So you're talking proceeding east across Passyunk Avenue onto Fitzwater?

Right.

And then continuing east to Fifth?

Right. The corner of Fifth and Fitzwater Streets is fine. We have one crossing guard there. There's another crossing guard at Fourth and Fitzwater. They're wonderful. We have crosswalks. The reason why I felt it was important to highlight our experience is that I'm hoping that the emphasis of Mr. Goldsmith's task force is not just on the designated school crossing areas adjacent to the school, but streets that might be unsafe immediately surrounding the school that are known to be part of the path that children take to get to and from school. In the beginning of 2001 when our daughter was in first grade, we spoke to Principal Stuart Cooperstein about what we can do to campaign to get some kind of safety 144 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 thing done on Passyunk Avenue. He encouraged us and supported our doing petitions to the Commissioner of the Department of Streets, which we did. We gathered 250 signatures, and I believe those were parents, and then another 50 kids signed up. And I brought those, for what they're worth. This evidence is our level of support commitment and concern at our school. What we asked for was basically anything. We wanted a study, which we got. We asked for either a crosswalk, slow sign, school zone signs, even a guard. But of course we knew the guard would be a real long shot. As I said, a study was done, and we copied our petitions to Councilman DiCicco, so he's been aware of our efforts, and Mr. Green also got copies of everything. In 2002, the study was done by a Department of Streets engineer. And in my conversation with him -- and I never got a copy of the report, but in my conversation with him it was pretty clear that he interpreted the regulations as not allowing school zone signs on any street or 145 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 any highway that's not adjacent to the school, and the crosswalk issue couldn't be handled because he didn't see this as an appropriate intersection or an appropriate place to put a crosswalk, according to PA DOT regs. Not being an engineer, not being an attorney versed in traffic regulations, I simply moved to plan B, which was to apply for flashers. So that's what we did. What I will say they did at the Department of Streets was they did agree to block off several spaces where people park so that at least when we dodged between parked cars, we're dodging between hopefully maybe 15 feet or more.

More site line.

There is some kind of site line. But there's nothing that shows people that this is really the place to cross, and there's nothing on Passyunk Avenue that slows cars down. We applied flashers for 2002. Councilman DiCicco approved them, got them through. This is Exhibit C, our application 146 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 for flashers. The application, as I said, was approved. We requested flashers for Passyunk Avenue because there is a crosswalk. There are crosswalks and a guard at Fifth and Fitzwater Streets right in front of the school entrance. In September 2003 the flashers were installed, but they were not installed on Passyunk Avenue at any point on the avenue. They were installed at Fifth and Fitzwater Street right under the nose of the guard and right next to the entrance to the school. I did look at these PA DOT regs at that time and I saw that clearly flashers were not supposed to be installed within an area less than 150 feet from the entrance to the school. I'm not sure what gave rise to that, but I can site you the regulation. Again, I wrote Mr. Green. No response. Really I felt completely powerless, other than choosing to do a lawsuit, a class action suit or filing appeals from determinations I had no evidence or no 24 documentation about. Other than doing the lawyer thing, I felt politically hopeless. I 147 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 felt that nobody cared, other than Councilman DiCicco and the people in the school community. And I also felt that rather than finding ways to do something to help, the powers that be were either ignoring the request or finding excuses not to do anything.

That is the Traffic Engineering Division. It's the "no" department.

This is what I've learned.

Actually, I think -- John's not here -- I think four years ago we had a hearing on the optic yellow-grown crossing signs that they testified that they don't work, that they don't reduce -- there's no greater visibility, that they're too expensive, that they're too hard to maintain. I didn't call them on today, but today in their testimony they're replacing all the old signs with the optic yellow-green. So there's like a four-year delay button, a four or five-year delay button in new ideas before it 148 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 finally gets to them. What I will do is bring this to the attention of Phil Goldsmith, relative to their task force, see if they can't take a look at it again, make sure I let Councilman DiCicco know what we're doing and maybe this is the right time to get at least some signage, if not a -- I don't see why you can't have a painted crosswalk there. That to me is the cheapest and easiest thing to do with signage. If for some reason or other the flashers aren't able to be there, at least that painted crosswalk at Passyunk and Fitzwater makes some sense, along with some signage. This may be an opportune time with all the scrutiny on this to get them to move in that direction. I will do my best.

That would be wonderful. We'd be very appreciative.

Thanks. Thanks for hanging around for the testimony. We appreciate it.

Thank you for having us. 149 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035

My name is Sean McAleer, Director of Planning and Development for Franklin Town Charter High School. I'd like to thank the Committee for allowing me to speak. As you are aware, one afternoon a 14-year-old freshman, Ashley Thorpe (ph), was struck by a pick-up truck while she was leaving the grounds of Franklin Town Charter High School, which is located in the Arsenal on Tacony Street, Bridge and Tacony Streets in the Northeast section of Philadelphia. Ashley is lucky to be alive. I wasn't there to see the accident, but from what I was told she was crossing on a green light and the pick-up truck ran a red light, made a right turn and struck her. Also from what I've told there's an ongoing investigation. No tickets have been written so far. To date we have no traffic devices at all. We have no crosswalks, no safety cards, no school zones. We have nothing in place. We have gone to local politicians in the past and they have worked very diligently. 150 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 We are on a list to get these devices, but unfortunately it takes time to get these done. I have 925 students currently enrolled, up to 50 percent of those students walk to and from school in that area. And if you're familiar with the area, the speed limit is 35. There's one posted sign further down from the Arsenal. But it's just a raceway.

It's a raceway with trucks.

With trucks, with cars. To escape 95 traffic, cars constantly take Tacony Street. At least Tacony Street, we have a traffic light. On the Bridge Street side we don't even have a traffic light in place. There is no traffic light at all except if you walk up to the corner. Of course, we have the safety in place for the school that we tell all the kids they have to go up to the corners, which most of them do, but of course they're kids. So sometimes kids do what they have to do and cross the street. But on the Bridge Street side we don't have a traffic light. 151 04/22/04 - RESOLUTION 040035 We have had several occasions, close calls, run-ins that we've also let our local politicians know, and they have come back and done studies and made people work and put us on list, but to date nothing has been done, and I just feel really bad that something like this had to happen to Ashley that's home suffering right now and we don't know how the outcome is going to be. So I just ask for the Committees -- I am glad that there is a task force that is formed, but we're a charter school. We're different from the public schools. The charter schools, we don't have what the public schools have in place. We don't have all these devices and financial abilities to put them in place. So we really need help, the whole charter school community, which there's 47 charter schools in the City of Philadelphia. We need help and we need it now. We need it not in September. I just ask for you to take a bigger look at this and take a look at it now before -- like I said, 925 kids -- before another child gets hurt. 152

I agree. I think the time is very opportune for this kind of attention. It's sad to say that Ashley had to be the cause of it. But thank God she was not killed. I think we can bring this also to the Managing Director's attention to see if we can get some action on it quickly.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. Is there anyone else to testify on this resolution? (No response.)

Seeing none, we thank everybody for your attendance. And the Committee intends shortly to cull through this information and to issue a report that hopefully can be used in this task force effort to improve the situation. Thanks again to the Daily News for their efforts. We appreciate it. This Committee is adjourned. (Council adjourned at 4:00 p.m.) 153 C E R T I F I C A T I O N I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Thursday, April 22, 2004, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of the same. RE: COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT and PUBLIC SAFETY _________________________ Lisa C. Bradley, RPR