Wanderings – Charity shouldn’t begin at crosswalks
Last week, a group of over 100 women met to choose between five organizations which project they would support with their money. The “100 Women Who Care” movement, if you will, is a simple concept—take 100 women with $100 each, and let groups ask for their vote and their money.
I’ve had the opportunity to present in front of the local 100 Women and 100 Men groups in my area on a few occasions. The organization I was there for did receive some money towards it’s project.
These funding groups are great, as they often serve as a catalyst to future fundraising and even if the groups making a pitch do not win, they gain exposure for their project. That can often turn into good things like other funding opportunities and more.
This year’s local 100 Women group picked two projects to fund, but the second project that won bothered me – a solar-powered crosswalk. It wasn’t that the crosswalk, which will protect a busy street crossing for youth going between the waterfront park and the splash pad, isn’t needed; it’s that a piece of needed municipal infrastructure had to go to a charity group of 100-plus women to be selected in order for it to receive some funding. How sad is it that the town I live in couldn’t afford a crosswalk to improve safety, and a charity group had to step in to pay for part of it? Are municipal finances that bad?
The street the crosswalk will go on divides the waterfront park, and despite a few intersections on the street, there are no stop signs anywhere along its 1.5-kilometre length. That street is a known raceway for youthful drivers, and is well trafficked in the summertime. There are cars parked everywhere on that street due to there being two baseball diamonds backing onto it, along with the beach and other park amenities, which makes crossing the street hazardous for pedestrians—yet cross the street many must.
The municipality I live in has seen property tax increases of five per cent or higher a year for the last three years. With that tax money, it has paved roads, operated parks, kept the lights on at the arena, and all kinds of other things that municipal governments do. Everything but address safety issues.
Frequent editorials in the paper have called for crosswalks and other safety installations to protect pedestrians. Many high school students and residents cross a busy highway to get to businesses on the other side.
But the crosswalks are coming: one this year far away from the school, the other one maybe next year. And two businesses in the area are paying for the installations by local government.
Now the local government is essentially competing against other fundraising groups to pay for capital items that it should already be covering through taxation. That is embarrassing. People shouldn’t be forced to play a live-action game of Frogger to go get lunch, just as municipalities shouldn’t rely on charity for a simple item that most municipalities just buy and put in.
According to the solar crosswalk presentation, the equipment cost is $11,000, and it costs about $2-4,000 to install. Our community spent $50,000 on a snowplow truck to get an extra axle; that could have paid for three crosswalks, with a round of coffees left to spare.
It shouldn’t have taken a citizen and former member of the local waterfront committee to go to a charity presentation and ask for money for a safety appliance that municipal leaders should have seen was an issue and addressed. Good on that citizen for asking the charity group, and good on that charity group’s members for fulfilling a need that our municipal government simply could not afford. It is unfortunate that other groups worthy of support had to miss out because of it.
Safety appliances like crosswalks in busy areas shouldn’t be a charity matter. It should be part of a plan by municipal leaders to look at safety issues and traffic, then plan accordingly. Then that plan ought to be implemented by the municipality so safety is improved.
If we can pave roads in the middle of the country, rebuild bridges for a few users on a road, and build new sidewalks while existing ones crumble, surely our tax dollars can put in a crosswalk. Based on the votes last week – apparently not.
This column was originally published in the June 18, 2025 print edition of the Morrisburg Leader.