Principal of Bonita Vista High School Responds to "Asking for Your Help with E-Bike Safety"

Image credit: inewsource

As I mentioned earlier in this online newspaper, I was going to reach out to administrators at schools that our local e-bikers might attend.

So I wrote "Asking for Your Help with E-Bike Safety" and sent it to Bonita Valley Senior High, Bonita Valley Junior High, Allen Elementary, Sunnyside Elementary and Valley Vista Elementary staff.

Here is the contents of the email I sent to the high school:

Dear Principal Salazar, Assistant Principals Siragusa, Fernandez, Sanchez and Cobian of Bonita Vista Senior High . . .

I live in Bonita-Sunnyside where many of your students also live. We are having a slight problem here with teenage e-bikers as many towns across San Diego County are.

I write a community newspaper/blog named Sunnyside Common Sense. I am also a former elementary school teacher. I know that when I had a classroom issue, I would often call in a resource person to talk to the class. One year I had a student lighting fires. I asked the Fire Department for someone to speak on arson. It corrected the problem and the student was never named.

I’m hoping that you could maybe do something like that at Bonita Vista Senior High, in the way of a general assembly. I don’t want to take away their fun, we just don’t want them playing in the middle of traffic where they—or an unsuspecting motorist—could be hurt.

The County is concerned about the amount of traffic and accidents on our streets and sent DPW Project Manager Robert Sanchez to speak at the 03.03.26 Sweetwater Community Planning Group Meeting.  Our toll-avoidance traffic increased this year from 10,000 vehicles daily to 19,000 . . . almost double! The kids are riding in the midst of this, ignoring traffic signals and popping wheelies. They are just being kids.

I have contacted Trails representatives this past week to see if a trail or playground could be vacated for the e-bikers' sole use. That is in the early stages of discussion.

I wrote an article last week titled “Teenage E-Bikers Causing Some Recent Havoc in Bonita-Sunnyside.” It discusses a free injury prevention course available to the students. Maybe that could be your resource.

I’m also including a well-written article by John Branch titled “In Defense of Teenage Boys on E-Bikes Doing Wheelies Where They Probably Shouldn’t" that discusses the pros of riding e-bikes. You can see by the 800+ responses that the feelings are mixed.

Anything that you can do to help with this issue would be greatly appreciated. We don’t want to wait until someone gets badly injured or killed. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Susan Heavilin, Editor

Sunnyside Common Sense

sunnysidecommonsense@gmail.com

Here is the wonderful email I received in response from Principal Salazar:

Ms. Heavilin,

Good morning and thank you so much for reaching out to us!  We value our community partnerships as stated in our Mission Statement –so again and sincerely—thank you!  I also had the opportunity to read both the article you wrote and Mr. Branch's blog on Facebook, which offered a different perspective.  I will work with our Grants and Communication Office to determine how we want to communicate our perspective to our school community and stance on safety related to E-Bikes, and what we can do as a school community to better inform and protect our students.

Lastly, thank you for your service to education as an Elementary School Teacher and for your continued involvement in the community.  It does take a village to both raise and keep our students safe, so, again, thank you for reaching out, providing diverse viewpoints, and, most importantly, providing us with some resources that we can offer our community to ensure our students stay safe within our community and keep others safe as well.

Sincerely,

Alex Salazar

This is just a start . . . but a fantastic start. I'm hoping that our community can work together in keeping these kids safe while still enjoying their adventurous adolescence.

Return to Main Page