Parents Angry After City Decides Not to Hire A Subdivision Crossing Guard

It is a follow up to a story the KTAL Troubleshooters first brought you in September. Traffic inside Bossier City`s Stockwell Place subdivision near Stockwell Elementary is chaotic right before and after school. That`s why Stockwell parents want another crossing guard stationed inside Stockwell Place subdivision. Danny Dison, Director of Security for Bossier Parish Schools, is aware of those concerns. "There were approximately 7 or 8 children who cross the street," Dison said," that`s a low volume but 1 child being unsafe is a concern." Dison asked a supervisor employed by both the school board and the Bossier City Police Department to check out the crossing and make a reccomendation. "We will fund half of it, but, we don`t have the final say," Dison said. That is because the other half of the crossing guard`s salary has to come from the Bossier City Police Department. " We just do not feel that the information we gathered through out monitoring of that location warrants the addition of a crossing guard," Mark Natale, Bossier City Police Dept., said. Adding an additional crossing guard would cost the Bossier Parish School Board and Bossier City about $600 per month, $300 each. With only a few students using this crossing, the city has decided that expense is not justified. Since the KTAL Troubleshooters picked up this case, traffic at Stockwell Place has gotten better and many parents are walking their children to school.