Potter Jr. High traffic is dangerous

On March 15, I picked up a friend’s child from Potter Junior High on Reche Road. I had just picked up children at Live Oak School and the high school. I was appalled at the traffic maze at Potter.

This is a very dangerous situation with serious injury or death just waiting to happen. While going east on Reche and waiting behind an SUV to get into the first parking lot to do a pickup, a lady came out of the same parking lot trying to make a left in front of the SUV. A very young person traveling east quite fast laid a lot of skid marks before he stopped just before he broadsided the lady turning left.

There were cars and kids everywhere. Since seeing this today I have called the Sheriff’s Department, who referred me to the Highway Patrol in charge of traffic control.

The Highway Patrolman agreed that this is a dangerous area when school is letting out but does not have enough officers for traffic control that I requested. He gave me the phone number of Tom Perry, Department Chairman of San Diego County Roads Advisory Committee: (858) 874-4009. I also phoned both the Potter Junior High administrator and the school district’s superintendent’s office at (760) 723-7025.

What can you do? Please do not make left turns out of the parking lots at Potter Junior High during drop-off and pick-up. It is too hard to see oncoming traffic. If you approach that area and see children, slow down – way down.

Please advise your teenagers who drive of the dangers around schools when they drive. Call the phone numbers in this letter and voice your concerns about the safety issues at Potter before someone is seriously injured or killed. Hopefully if enough people voice their concern, changes will happen and this dangerous area will become safer for our children and those who transport them.

Jean L. Budd