During the Feb. 24 North Wasco County School District (NWCSD) regular school board meeting, Katie Selin of Alta Planning and Design, an active transportation planning, design and engineering firm based out of Portland, gave a report on North Wasco County’s Safe Routes to School Program.
The Safe Routes to School in North Wasco County is a program through the Oregon Department of Transportation that focuses on making active transportation, such as walking or biking, safer and more accessible to student and families through the improvement of infrastructure and education and encouragement programs.
Focusing on Chenoweth and Colonel Wright Elementary schools, according to Selin, Alta Planning and Design has been working with North Wasco County for the last year, collaborating with the school district, Mid-Columbia Economic Development District (MCEDD), and the City of The Dalles to gather data on areas within a quarter mile of both schools, or “key locations” up to a mile away from each school, that pose potential safety risks for pedestrians, and put together a plan on how to create a safer, more accessible path to both schools, doing so through methods such as performing in person walk audits once COVID-19 guidelines allowed, observing student drop off and pick up times, speaking with parents, and online input maps. The plan presents an assessment of existing conditions and poses recommendations for infrastructure improvements and education and encouragement opportunities for safe driving around bicyclists and pedestrians, as well recommended funding opportunities through state grants.
“The idea is that these safe routes to school plans identify projects and programs to make it more accessible for students and families to walk, bike and take the transit,” said Selin, “and really specifically, they feed into grants that the state has available for funding construction projects and education and improvement around Safe Routes to School. And so this work basically identifies projects that can be pulled right into those grant applications.”
“I was part of this process several years ago when it was just getting off the ground … the comprehensiveness of where you’ve gone from there, the ability now to secure grants and get funding, and the coordination with public works and the city, is just awesome how far that has come,” said Director John Nelson.
“I was part of those walkability studies in the west end of town, and I remember almost getting hit by a car just doing the audit and thinking ‘oh my goodness, a person half my size wouldn’t be seen by a car,’ so thank you for this,” said Director Judy Richardson.
According to Selin, a draft of the Safe Routes to School plan is current circulating for public feedback, and Alta hopes to have to the finalized plan mid-March.
Concealed carry discussed
During the public comment period of the meeting, no members of the public signed up to speak, though eight written comments were submitted to the school board. The majority of the comments were in regard to Policy KGBB: Firearms Prohibited, for which the school board held its first reading during their Jan. 20 school board meeting. Senate Bill 554, which was passed by the 2021 Oregon Legislature, now allows school districts the option to adopt a policy prohibiting conceal carry license holders from carrying firearms on district property. According to the policy, “No person on grounds of schools controlled by the board (including in school buildings) will possess any firearm, except when said firearm is possessed by a person who is not otherwise prohibited from possessing the firearm, and is unloaded and locked in a motor vehicle.”
The policy states that law enforcement is still permitted to carry weapons on district property, and the superintendent “may authorize other persons to possess weapons for courses, programs and activities when in compliance with law and board policy.”
Oregon law has allowed conceal carry license holders to carry firearms on district property in accordance with ORS 166.370(3)(g). Should the school board choose to adopt the policy, it would be required to post the notification on the school website as well as signage at all public entrances to all district owned property.
“I urge you not to prohibit law abiding citizens who possess valid Oregon Concealed Handgun Licenses (CHL) from possessing their concealed handguns while on Wasco County School property,” said Terry Smith in an email submitted to the school board for the Feb. 24 meeting, “To make these legally licensed and registered citizens felons for following their otherwise lawful rights is an unjustified violation of their rights.”
“The adoption of this policy restricting concealed carry would be a mistake,” wrote Erik Wright. “There’s no foreseeable safety benefit to this policy. I cannot find a single case of a CHL holder being involved in any form of school shooting. These are legally armed, law-abiding citizens.”
“Those who obey the law get a permit, which includes: Filling out an application, getting fingerprinted, background checked, photographed, paying a fee and carrying a permit at all times when carrying a firearm,” wrote Paul Ashton to the school board. “Criminals ignore the above requirements. Vote no on this policy.”
After the first reading in the Jan. 20 meeting, the school board made the decision to withhold a second reading of Policy KGBB, as well as policy JFCJ: Weapons in School. “I think that, just because there’s a lot of nuances to this … the senate bill 554 is not requiring us to have this policy, we actually have a decision in that, and, in my mind, that isn’t a decision that we should just make ourselves as a board,” said Board Chair Jose Aparicio. “I think we should engage our stakeholders in this conversation before we make this decision … I think some of those stakeholder groups that we need are our law enforcement partners, our staff, our parents, there’s a lot of people I think we need to hear from before fully making a decision on whether this fits for D21.”
According to the board, full text of all letters can be found in the meeting minutes. To view the entire school board meeting, visit District 21 Media channel on Youtube.
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