Students Ask Marysville Mayor For Help With Busy Intersection

MARYSVILLE (CBS13) - They are nowhere near old enough to vote, but a group of students at a Marysville elementary school are taking civic action, asking the city to add stop signs to what they say is a dangerous intersection.

Here's the problem with this intersection. It's right next to Covillaud Elementary School, and it's only a two-way stop sign. Cars fly by here.

For years parents and students say they have felt unsafe crossing the street.

Veda Smith and Noel Weaver seem like your typical fifth grade girls, but these two best friends are also the president and vice president of the student council. And they want change.

"There's been a few accidents around school, so we just wanted to inform the mayor about it," Veda Smith said.

For a decade fifth grade teacher Dale Van Liew has watched vehicles speed through the intersection next to the Covillaud.

"I literally grabbed a kindergartener once to prevent that child from running out into the street," he said.

Veda, Noel and 50 other kids had enough. They each wrote a letter to the mayor asking the city to add a few stop signs.

"How would you like to get injured, or even die, just crossing the street to school?" Noel read from her letter.

"It would make me feel so good because I'd know that it could save a kid's life, an adult's life even," Noel said.

A representative from the Marysville Police Department said they didn't have enough time Monday to look up accident and citation records for the intersection, and the city manager told us the city was unaware of any traffic problems at that spot.

"From my principal, it's been a growing concern for about 15 years now at least, and it seems a little hard to believe," teacher Pat Hogan said of the city's response.

The city manager said it would cost a few hundred dollars to add the stop signs to the intersection but that the city isn't sure it would be cost-effective to do so.

The mayor was out of town and unavailable for comment.