FRANCONIA, Va. — Fairfax County officials are weighing different options to find a solution to an issue school districts are dealing with across the country — staffing enough crossing guards.
There are about 200 schools in Fairfax County. Many are located along busy roads and require crossing guards. There are 164 crossing locations, where crossing guards are needed twice a day for 30 minutes a day. That means, in total, they have to cover 328 crossing each school day.
Right now, they have 52 crossing guards employed, and patrol officers fill the spots they can't cover.
"We've got some parameters that we look at to determine whether a crossing guard is needed. There's a minimum number of students that have to be crossing at a particular location, there's a number of vehicles. Those factors are the things we use today to determine where we should have crossing guards," said Franconia District Supervisor Rodney Lusk.
He's also the chair of the public safety and security committee.
Last week, the Fairfax County Police Department presented their concerns and recommendations to the board during the Safety and Security Committee Meeting.
"This program is decades old and hasn't changed," said Fairfax County Police Assistant Chief Bob Blakley.
Blakley explained that the position of 'Crossing Guard' falls under the Fairfax County Police Department, and they are only budgeted to hire 62 crossing guards.
"We obviously want to get those 10 plus on board, but we're thinking about having even more so that we don't have to have the police backfill it," said Lusk.
The county says the crossing guards are able to handle about 240 crossings per day. That leaves about 88 crossings that FCPD says they have to cover with patrol officers.
“So, even if we were at full capacity, they would probably be unable to cover all of the crossings,” Blakley said.
He recommended privatizing the crossing guard program under Fairfax County Public Schools.
"Based on local and national trends, we believe we should privatize the program entirely, so someone's paying full time attention to it," said Blakley.
Lusk said he's not necessarily opposed to privatization.
"We can't keep having our police officers standing in as crossing guards. We've got to have a solution. So, we think the better solution is to find individuals who can serve in that capacity and basically not burden the police," said Lusk.
The board members agreed something needs to be done, but some were hesitant about privatization as the option.
"This is a public safety issue and we need this to stay within the police department," said Fairfax County Supervisor Pat Herrity.
The board discussed several options at the meeting, including the way crossing guards are compensated in Fairfax County compared to other jurisdictions.
"Part of the work we have to do is we have to think about compensation, think about benefits and incentives. How do we encourage people to come into these positions," said Lusk.
Lusk told WUSA9 that the Fairfax County Executive first has to meet with FCPS Superintendent Michelle Reid, before they can move forward with any potential plans.
"Once that happens we'll hear back from the county executive on what transpired in that conversation and we'll have some direction on what steps we want to take," said Lusk.
Only then can they start discussing whether they should increase the number of budgeted crossing guard positions, or consider other options.
"We'll have to figure out what the right number is. That's part of the process that the County Executive is going to undertake with the Superintendent. They're going to look at how do we determine how many crossing guards that we need and then have a bench. So the crossing guards who call in and say 'I can't come in today', that's part of the problem. You can have 52, but then you might only have 30 who show up," said Lusk
He said none of this should impact the upcoming school year.
"What we're doing is laying the groundwork to make the changes that will be necessary for the next academic year," said Lusk.