School zone safety is not a problem

The July 31 Leader-post article, regarding lowering the speed limit to 30 km/ h in school zones, appears to be a solution without a problem. The article did not mention the cost, to the taxpayers, of this change.

The current practice of restricting right turns on a red light and on-street parking adjacent to schools, is an effective and efficient means of protecting children on their way to and from school.

The school trustee quoted in this article states “Why do we have to wait for someone to be killed or injured to take action”.

This is unreasonable scaremongering. Deaths and injuries in school zones, with the existing 40 km/ h speed limit, are not a problem in our city.

This issue is not the only example of city council allocating tax dollars to “fix” a problem that doesn’t exist.

Despite the fact that the rental vacancy rate is close to seven per cent, council has chosen to continue to provide millions of dollars worth of grants and tax exemptions for the construction of new rental units.

When the vacancy for rental properties was below two per cent, these programs made sense.

Now, they are financially irresponsible and completely unnecessary.

This money, along with the cost savings from not changing the school zone speed limit, would go a long way toward improving the safety and accessibility of the roads and sidewalks in the shamefully neglected older areas of our city. That’s a REAL problem. During the July 30 meeting of city council, fixing the road and sidewalk safety issues raised by the residents of Hillsdale and Whitmore Park seemed to be contingent on tax increases, levies, or an increase in federal or provincial funding.

I feel very strongly that city council needs to re-examine its own financial priorities before complaining about the federal and provincial governments’ funding decisions, or further raise municipal taxes.

Linda Mckenzie, Regina