Ring-a-ding-dong went the Red Phone this week with questions about who took the biggest steps toward finding a cure for cancer in San Benito last weekend and how safe students crossing Nash Road at San Benito High School will be this school year. Yes, they called and Red Phone heard their queries. Have a question and can’t find the answer, try the Red Phone. Always listening, always on-line, always available at 635-9219.
A short walk for big bucks
A caller dialed in the Red Phone curious over who the big dollar earner was at the Relay for Life.
“I participated in this weekend’s Relay for Life and I was just wondering if you could tell me which group made the most money for cancer research,” she said.
With over a whopping $22,000 raised, Earth Bound Farms of San Juan Bautista stepped into the top spot for this year’s Relay. Michael Beltran was the single biggest dollar earner. However, the real winners are people hoping to find a cure to the terrible disease. Collectively, the Relay raised more than $197,000 and counting according to Relay chairperson Jeana Arnold.
“We’re getting more money in every day,” she said.
Safety Steps
Another caller asked the Red Phone to find out what San Benito High School is doing to ensure student safety when crossing Nash Road to get to class.
“High school starts in two weeks. What has been decided about Nash Road so students can cross safely?” she asked.
Quite a bit has been decided and a whole lot has been done according Director of Finance and Operations Steve Delay. He said the school has been working to increase crossing safety for students for about the last five years and a number of measures have been put into effect. He said the ultimate goal is to close Nash Road from West Street to Monterey Street, but that can’t happen until Westside Boulevard is completed. For this year, however, the school will paint larger crosswalks, install crosswalk signs in the middle of them, add new signage before the crosswalks, install rumble strips on the road to alert drivers the crosswalks are coming up, red-stripe the curbs to prevent vehicles from parking in the area to make students more visible to drivers and that’s about it. Of course, these measures are in addition to other safety steps taken in the past such as installing flashing lights alerting drivers and assigning campus supervisors to stop traffic and escort students across the street. Sound safe? It is, according to Delay, who said to the best of his knowledge it’s been at least 30 years since a student was hit by a car on the road during school hours.
“This is what will be done hopefully by when school starts on August 23,” he said.
