Rumford students to get safer walk home

RUMFORD — A concerted effort by municipal officials and the grant-writing skills of the parent of a Rumford Elementary School student has resulted in funding for safer sidewalks.

The town has been notified of an $80,000 grant from the Maine Department of Transportation to improve pedestrian safety along Essex, Oxford and Maine avenues.

Laurie Soucy, a school health coordinator with years of grant-writing experience, wrote the document after meeting with the police chief, a selectman and three teachers, Principal Anne Chamberlin said.

“We saw it as a need, because kids were walking on the road,” Chamberlin said. “We're pleased.”

Soucy said she used her contacts with the Healthy Maine Partnership in writing the grant. Her daughter attends the school. She said the MDOT would meet with the local group to work on a plan. The town's match will be in planning and labor.

Chamberlin said the streets near the school are always filled with vehicles when school lets out for the day.

“Once the sidewalk ends, the kids walk in the road," she said. "They are not cognizant that they may be walking in the road. There have been close calls and the potential is there for an accident.”

The MDOT notification letter says that the funding will be available no earlier than October 2009 and that the work must be completed during the department's 2010-11 biennium.

eadams@sunjournal.com