Council asks schools to go to townships, cities for stop-arm camera funding
The Dubois County Council balked at agreeing to outright fund a request from the county’s school corporations for stop-arm cameras.
The council agreed to consider the request but echoing Dubois County Commissioner Chad Blessinger’s thoughts at a meeting earlier this month, told the superintendents to reach out to the county’s townships and cities for help.
Northeast Dubois Superintendent Bill Hochgesang appeared before the council Monday evening to ask for their help to fund the new cameras designed to capture images of stop-arm violators. Under a new Indiana law, school corporations can petition the county to create a fund to have fines from these types of violations be used to pay for the cameras on buses.
The superintendents feel the stop-arm cameras will help prosecute offenders and impact the number of stop-arm violations on bus routes. Hochgesang told the council Northeast Dubois typically has five to 10 stop-arm violations every day.
A single bus in the county has the cameras at this time. Hochgesang told the council that with the recent publicity after the superintendents spoke with the county commissioners earlier this month, the Dubois County Community Foundation had reached out to assist the project with a grant. He also reported that a resident in Jasper had paid for two sets of cameras for Greater Jasper Consolidated School Corporation buses.
Hochgesang had told commissioners they would like help from the county to create the fund and fund cameras systems for 12 bus routes with a focus on high traffic areas.
At Monday’s meeting, Hochgesang told the council the superintendents had decided since then to ensure all the buses in the county had the cameras in three years. He explained they had received calls from parents questioning what busses would have the cameras and whether their children’s buses would have them.
He requested the county help with the initial 12 cameras to help jumpstart the project at a cost of about $22,000. Those cameras would be installed this summer.
“We want to do our most dangerous areas first,” Hochgesang explained.
Council President Jerry Hunefeld told Hochgesang that there are several taxing units involved — the cities, townships, county and schools. “Is there any possibility they can do something,” he asked deferring to the other taxing units.
Hochgesang said he was unaware if they could go to the townships and would have to check with the county attorney.
County Auditor Sandy Morton told the council they would likely need to create a fund — School Safety Fund — for the potential funds that come in through stop-arm violation prosecutions. She was unsure whether the fund could be used to reimburse townships and cities. The law says the funds can only be used to reimburse the schools for the stop-arm cameras.
Councilman Doug Uebelhor is employed at Washington Community Schools. He explained they have stop-arm cameras installed but they have not had any money come back to the school corporation from fines.
Hochgesang said he was sure they would have successful prosecutions come from these cameras in Dubois County.
“I think the reason we (superintendents, the four of us chose to go this route with the county is because we want prosecutions, and we want the county to be involved,” he said. “We want the public to understand why we’re doing what we’re doing and maybe help educate people that running the stop arm is really a very terrible thing and a very dangerous thing for our kids. It’s kind of a win-win, you know, because (with cameras) we’re going to see an increase in prosecutions when we get these cameras, there’s no doubt.”
The council told Hochgesang they would take the request under advisement.
Northeast Dubois Superintendent Bill Hochgesang told the council he would talk to the townships in his district.
Why not fund this? We are talking about children safety. A few thousand put in. And get more from the other government entities. If we can spend 41 million on jail improvements, we can certainly afford this. Seriously.
There is no reason why the county shouldn’t pay for these cameras for the children safety. We are spending all this money on jail expansion. The safety of the children in this community should be a priority.
I agree to an extent what Skippy said.
I do think funding for the cameras should be made available to all 4 Dubois county School Corporation’s.
Our children’s safety should be a priority. Our number one priority shouldn’t be shifting the responsibility onto another Government entity.
But I do believe the jail improvements are necessary. Moving the Court Rooms, the Probation Office, the Prosecuting Attorney’s office, etc. closer to the jail will be better for everyone. These areas should be easily accessible with plenty of parking.
One question I have is could the improvements on the Courthouse be put on hold? The money designated for those improvements could be put towards the camera’s.
Agree with the others on the stop-arms. And there would be additional money available by nixing those tattle-tale vehicle locators – stupid idea – to spy on employees when they don’t get from point-A to point-B fast enough. If supervisors want to know where their trucks are at or what’s the delay, just radio and ask them, or radio for any vehicle in an area to answer…it’s not rocket science (and much cheaper). The stop arms and children’s safety is MUCH more important.