The city continues to struggle to meet its needs for adult crossing guards and regularly uses full-time city staff to fill the gaps.
There are currently 33 locations in the city where adult crossing guards are used and they are serviced by 40 regular and nine back-up crossing guards.
“Maintaining a full complement of guard staff continues to be a challenge,” says a staff information report.
“Despite the improvement to the retention of ASCG (adult school crossing guards) over the past few school years, full time Transportation staff are still required to fill guard vacancies on a regular basis throughout the school year.
“The principle challenges that the program faces in recruitment are split shift hours, repeated exposure to traffic, compensation, and inclement weather.“
The city is eliminating crossing guards at the six locations that still have crossing guards over the lunch/nutrition break, not because of a lack of guard but because the volume of student traffic no longer warrants it, says the report.
Those locations will be eliminated prior to the 2018-2019 school year.
The city receives an average of 12 requests each year from the public looking to have adult crossing guards placed at a particular location. The city will study the location to see if one is warranted, using established criteria:
- Number of students grade 6 and under crossing (minimum 30)
- Three year collision history during school hours
- Lack of suitable gaps in traffic at midblock locations
- Sight line visibility
- Turning traffic at intersection locations.
