School zone safety is the focus of a city-wide meeting Tuesday night at Will James Middle School, sponsored by two neighborhood task forces.
For Leslie Cooke, the chair of the Rimrock Neighborhood Task Force, the meeting is a call to action. There have been too many pedestrian vehicle accidents in Billings, like the tragedy of the 13- year-old student hit by a car outside Will James Middle School in September.
The Rimrock and the Pioneer Park Task Forces are contacting PTA’s, school trustees, city officials and the general public to attend the gathering Tuesday at Will James cafeteria.
“The thing we are going to do is give them information, about what is in progress, what is being done, what is being considered. And then we want to hear everybody’s concerns,” explained Cooke.
She said she wants to hear questions and ideas.
“Should we decide as a community to put a school zone by Will James School where this accident happened? It’s about a quarter-mile stretch. If we reduce the speed limit from 35 mph to 25mpr, it would only cause a 10 second delay by a commuter headed into town. What is 10 seconds worth?,” Cooke asked.
Cooke said she hopes some of those in attendance will step forward, willing really get to work to keep this a hot topic and not just something that happened last month.
“That way city government really will understand how important this is to the community,” said Cooke.
The community meeting on school zone safety is Tuesday night, Oct.20, at 6pm at Will James Middle School Cafeteria.
