The quoted message is from an email list. I did not include any of the other comments in the email thread because I do not have their authorization to do so. My comments are provided below for reference. The basic premise is safety/security of our middle school age children before and after school.
"I am also concerned about the fighting that occurs, and the disrespect that happens - those are simply unacceptable. It has subsided some recently, but needs our attention as parents and as a community to ensure it stays that way.The bus stop in the morning is a bit different in my opinion. I personally observed things today and perhaps today is out of the ordinary so I'll continue to observe over the coming days. Based on my observations today it is my opinion that their playing catch is really no more dangerous then them walking through the "drive through"gates in the morning, trailing cars or walking between them, because the "walk through" gates are locked. Playing ball before school is perfectly normal and not all of them are involved. They play off of School road and only in the "cove" of Lake Talia Blvd outside the gate area, they announce the cars and scatter appropriately into safer areas when cars come. Nothing really out of the ordinary, other than school road drivers being a bit aggressive(I've observed cars at 50 MPH out there). I agree I'd prefer they play elsewhere in the morning, but I don't see a safer alternative unless things change a bit. Given the current bus stop location and gate situation playing inside the gates isn't really reasonable given the fact they'd all have to run through the "drive through" gate to get to the bus. Expecting them to sit quietly on the sidewalk at this age isn't reasonable either.If we could convince the school to make the bus come into the community to pick the the kids up in the morning, I'd be willing to let the kids use my yard to play in the morning. They could get picked up at the corner of Lake Talia Blvd and Patagonia Place (The first intersection). A secondary option would be to use the parking lot at the same intersection. They'd have a safer place to play and we wouldn't have to worry about traffic on School road in the morning. Just a thought - other suggestions and observations are welcome. BTW I think it is great we can all discuss these things as a community- it will be important to continue this dialog as the kids get older!"
Rocky
