York Regional Transit Bus Stop #1208
In December 2016 about 2:45 pm, I noticed that every day at Our Lady of Grace school every spot at the curb was occupied by a parent waiting for 3:00 pm. This put one or three cars INSIDE bus stop 1208 so I asked Bylaws to ticket them, but of course, since 2012 they have refused me ANY service.
In 2019, Denis Van Decker recorded another Catholic school where TWO Bylaws Officers explained why a parent could NOT park at the curb unless they were ACTIVELY loading or unloading…
He wrote:
Aurora Bylaw Bullies at it again. Almost 5 months in office and its time for Mayor Tom Mrakas to own up to the unaccountable private police force.
Yesterday while picking up my son at Ecole St. Jean on Walton we were met by two bylaw officers taking up parking and blocking traffic with their flashing lights on (they like their toys) who were talking to another parent and the School Principal. You can see most of the interaction in this video that I took. Sorry some of Audio is not great. I had to edit out a part in the middle with an irate parent who was swearing at them. The frustration was understandable as they were unwanted, on private property, blocking school pickup – causing all children to be kept in school and also holding up buses. Creating problems, where none existed instead of solving them – typical for the unaccountable Aurora ByLaw Bullies.
They were there to ticket people as they did not think that the school was properly operating a “Kiss and Ride” because they queue up in parking lot just before last bell. This is Ridiculous! According to these guys they would rather have a child loading system be more active with cars and loading ! That is the opposite of any safety practice for kids in a school parking lot. These Einsteins would prefer that the cars are queuing up in the street or circling the neighbourhood (The principal goes through that with them) – exacerbating an already very busy residential neighbourhood at that time as there is also Lester B Pearson French Immersion in same block that would be circled both of which have very high percentage of students being bussed and transported as the schools serve wide areas.
More fundamentally to the issue of the law:
1. The school is private property they were not invited onto it. They have no legal right to be there nor to enforce any parking bylaws.
2. There is no official definition of “Kiss and Ride” …. At least I googled for an hour and could not find anything. Especially not in Aurora Bylaws nor Provincial Laws. Again, the Bylaw Bullies are just making it up as they go along.
I have some regrets that I did not speak up on these issues but that would have interfered with the video. But it is not too late to rein in these bullies.
Our School has safely operated complex pick up and drop off for years without bylaw involvement and refined the process over time to the current valet type delivery of a child to a car. Part of the practice is minimizing movement that these bullies are trying to have changed.
Now is the time to for Mayor Mrakas rein in this private Police Force, or as he now accepted it as his own private police force like the Mayor before – or we can just refer to them as Tom’s Bylaw Bullies (??)