In an effort to reduce postage costs in fiscal year 2020 Whitman began mailing real estate and personal property bills twice a year instead of four times a year. In July taxpayers were mailed a double coupon “preliminary” tax bill which included a remittance slip for the quarterly bills due both on Aug. 1 and a Nov. 1. The “actual” tax billing in December will also include two remittance slips for the Feb. 1 and May 1 due dates. Please retain the second slip for the next due date.

Please refer to the “preliminary” real estate and personal property double coupon bill mailed in July for the second quarter remittance slip which is due on Nov. 1.

 If you have any questions regarding these changes, please contact the Collector’s Office at 781-618-9721.

HANSON — While most of the work is taking place over the town line in Hanover, Hanson residents had the chance to voice their concerns with state officials last week.

Mass DEP representatives Deborah Marshall-Hewitt and Gerard Martin provided an overview of the work done on the former National Fireworks Site — and a look ahead to the next phase of the work— during a Wednesday, Oct. 16 meeting at Hanson Middle School. Town Moderator Sean Kealy presided over the session attended by Selectmen Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett, Matt Dyer and Wes Blauss.

“The board thought that it was important to ask these folks from MassDEP to be here tonight to answer questions that might be unique to Hanson citizens,” said FitzGerald-Kemmett who chairs the Board of Selectmen.

Most of the questions at the Hanson forum focused on water contamination and blasting at the site.

Marshall-Hewitt, a 26-year veteran of MassDEP, is the Bureau of Waste Site Cleanup Audit section chief and project manager for the Fireworks site cleanup. Martin is deputy regional director for the Bureau of Waste Site Cleanup in the Southeast region.

She described the cleanup process contaminated waste goes through, location of munitions on the site and contact information for MassDEP and the state attorney general’s office. Video of the meeting can be viewed on the Whitman-Hanson Community Access TV website.

“No public or private water supply wells have been impacted by the contaminants released at the site,” Marshall-Hewitt said. “That’s a really important piece. I think a few residents in Hanover didn’t quite understand [that], but we have tested groundwater — a lot of the wells in the area receive drinking water from municipal water supply wells. Those municipal water supply wells are tested separately from what we are doing at the fireworks site.”

She said the results have been fine.

Martin added that municipal wells are also required to tap into Zone 2 acquifers, a zone of groundwater no where near the fireworks site.

Right now access to the fireworks factory site is restricted and patrolled by Hanover Police, who have made a number of arrests and stopped several others from entering the site, according to Marshall-Hewitt. People who fish in affected water will not be harmed by handling the fish, but are advised not to eat the fish.

“There has been a fish advisory out for a long time,” she said of mercury contamination. Phase three will focus on dredging sediment to remove heavy contaminants such as mercury, as well as an Immediate Response Action for any more munitions found on the site. The estimated cost, to be shouldered by the parties responsible for contamination is $92 million, including dredging and disposal of dredged sediment.

The work is estimated to take three to four years, Marshall-Hewitt said, but Martin expects it to take longer.

“I think this could be optimistic,” he said. “This is a very involved project. They’re not even sure how they are going to do the dredging yet.”

The process has already taken 10 years, a resident said.

“There are a lot more than we anticipated that are being removed,” she said.

The site involves 240 acres bounded by Winter and King streets in Hanover and Hanson and had been used for the manufacture, testing and storage of fireworks and military ordnance from 1907 to the 1970s.

A Mass. Contingency Plan for the remediation of various chemical contaminants — primarily mercury and lead — is entering a third phase three, for which the public comment period closes Friday, Oct. 25.

“We will not comment on the phase three report until we get all the comments from the public,” Martin said. “We want to consider what your concerns are when we’re looking at this report and figuring out how to move forward.”

Phase three will include the evaluation and selection of cleanup alternatives, a draft of which was submitted to the MassDEP in July.

The Hanson town website (hanson-ma.gov) has links posted for information about what the project has accomplished and what is ahead.

Questions posed from a handful of Hanson residents Oct. 16 focused on the health impacts of lead and mercury contaminants, found in sediment of Factory Pond and Indian Head River.

Mercury was detected in sediment, soil, groundwater and fatty tissues of fish — as well as lead and volatile organic compounds — during phase two. Additional work included indoor air and irrigation well sampling, both of which were concerns expressed by Hanson residents.

State Street resident Peggy Westfield asked about cancers possibly related to the contamination from a personal vantage point. In 1988, her son Matthew died from leukemia at age 7.

“Does the DPH have all that information?” she asked about a Hanover brain cancer case being checked for a connection to the contamination. “Should I give them the information? If you look at people around this room … there are other kinds of cancer that I believe to be caused by this site.”

She pointed to the Indian Head River as a potential site. Martin said she should contact the DPH, which has two people investigating the connection with contamination.

Another asked about irrigation well contamination and explosions — the latter of which have caused cracked foundations not covered by homeowners’ insurance, and stress to pets that has led to destructive behavior.

“Everybody tells me it’s not their responsibility,” said one resident who noted only interim Town Administrator Meredith Marini has tried to help.

FitzGerald-Kemmett suggested the funds from responsible parties funding the site cleanup, should also be tapped to help homeowners.

Paul Nichol, a Winter Street resident, said his dog has suffered a great deal from the blasting.

“We’ve had thousands of dollars of damage caused by my dog,” he said. “The dog hears the siren and knows the explosion is coming, so he starts running through the house, throws himself through a glass door, tried to actually eat his way out of the house through a door.”

He has had to put the dog in day care.

“It’s too bad when these things follow you home,” said Conservation Commission member Phil Clemons, who has worked for 35 years in the environmental health and safety management in the corporate world. “This is the kind of project where you have a lot of overlap between environmental issues, wildlife issues, human health and human safety issues.”

As a youth, he said he used to fish in Factory Pond, expressing interest in the fish studies, as well as those into human health.

“A very high interest will continue to be sampling or removing sediment from the pond or from the streams,” he said. “Lots of things go on with sediment we don’t usually pay attention to or see, but, by golly, this calls for attention.”

A Sept. 24 public hearing in Hanover, described by most who attended both sessions as contentious, also featured representatives of the Mass. Department of Public Health, as well as staff members of U.S. Rep. Bill Keating and U.S. senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren — who were not present in Hanson.

Marshall-Hewitt said the MassDPH is now conducting a cancer study among people who live in proximity to the fireworks site, and provided general information at the Sept. 24 meeting.

Another meeting is planned for 6 p.m., Thursday, Nov. 14 at Hanover Town Hall, 550 Hanover St., to discuss an upcoming grant opportunity and planning process to identify and implement restoration projects that will restore fisheries, rivers, and wetlands in the North, Indian Head, and Drinkwater Rivers as well as Factory Pond. We recommend potential applicants attend to discuss project ideas before the North River Watershed Restoration Grant Announcement and Application (GAA) is issued in Fall/Winter 2019.

The potentially responsible parties from whom $68 million has been placed in an expendable trust for reimbursement or payment of response action costs are: National Coating Company, MIT, the bankrupt Susquehanna Corp., and Kerr-McGee Chemical Corp. (Tronox-bankrupt), which make up the Fireworks Site Joint Defense Group and the Defense Department.

HALIFAX — Mystery writer Edwin Hill is developing a following.

Most of the dozen or so people attending his talk about his second Hester Thursby novel, “The Missing Ones,” had already enjoyed his debut novel “Little Comfort,” and were happy to hear this newest work, too, strays into the realm of the creepy.

“Let me just ask, real quick — and there’s no wrong answer to this — who has read the first book?” he asked. Hands were raised around the room at the Holmes Public Library Saturday, Oct. 5. “A lot of you have already been introduced to the characters. … I have some repeat offenders who have come to see me before, which I really appreciate.”

Thursby, a Harvard librarian who stands all of four-feet nine inches tall, takes care of her 3-year-old niece, her non-husband Morgan Maguire and a Bassett hound named Waffles. She works on missing persons cases in her spare time.

Or, worked in missing persons cases.

“The Missing Ones” makes clear early on that Hester no longer does that kind of work, in fact she’s been avoiding working at all as she struggles from PTSD after a harrowing experience in the first published book.

Picking up 10 months after then end of “Little Comfort,” Hill was determined to reference things that happened in that book while writing “The Missing Ones.”

“Hester had made some pretty serious mistakes in the last book and I wanted her to acknowledge that,” he said. “I also wanted to show she had feelings of having been in a life-or-death situation.”

Hill referenced older books and TV series where the hero is shot in the shoulder in one storyline and it is never referred to again.

“I wanted the books to work together,” he said.

It opens on two small islands off the coast of Maine, loosely based on the real island of Monhegan. The prologue relates a ferry boat accident that caused a 4-year-old went missing for a time and the island’s constable is at first credited with saving the boy. While he is dealing with town gossip about how that incident played out, another child goes missing.

“I always tell stories from multiple points of view,” Hill said. “In ‘Little Comfort,’ there are five points of view … In this book I used four point-of-view characters.”

He credited readers with suggesting story line changes, including more for Hester’s “not-quite husband” Morgan to do.

A failed attempt at publishing a book in the early 2000s left him discouraged until he found the kernel of an idea in the Christian Gerhartsreiter — AKA Clark Rockefeller — a professional imposter who kidnapped his daughter and was later convicted of murder. By 2012 Hill was back to writing with an agent by 2014 and selling it two years ago.

“You’ll see the seeds of Clark Rockefeller in there, but it’s not completely based on that,” he said.

A library is another source of his inspiration.

Hill’s grandmother, Phyllis Hill was the librarian in Whitman from the 1940s to the late ’60s.

“For a while, she was going to be a chef,” Hill said of Hester Thursby’s day job. “Then I thought she might be a psychiatrist — a lot of mystery series have psychology at their core — but there are a lot of people doing that, and they do it very well, and I thought let’s do something different.”

He said librarians are really curious people, who have resources available to them that are not available to the average person, especially in 2010 when he wrote “Little Comfort.”

He started with a lighter touch, writing that Thursby’s caseload featured whimsical cases such as long-lost prom dates or lost dogs.

“The novels are not light,” he said. “They wound up becoming much darker as I worked on them over time.”

One whimsical touch he retained was making Hester “clinically messy” and Morgan a “neat freak,” along with their caring for Morgan’s twin sister Daphne’s headstrong 3-year-old daughter Kate.

“The novel went through three or four different changes and stopped being funny,” he said. “It’s not funny at all, it’s a psychological thriller.”

“The Missing Ones” carries that theme over, as well. Hill read an excerpt from the book’s first chapter and answered audience’s questions from the researching, writing and publishing process, the challenges of writing a second book, and his third book. Set in Boston, primarily in Jamaica Plain, that book involves a for-profit university and is due out in December.

To flesh out the characters of three individual preschool children, hill put out a Facebook request to parents about what they noticed about their kids as they aged from 3 to 4.

“People were really generous with things they shared,” he said, including how they start to grow more solidly and that they developed little obsessions.

“They listed off all these different things their kids had been obsessed with — bugs, and counting, Thomas the Tank Engine, and poop and peeing on trees,” he said. “If you have three 4-year-old [characters] they can end up merging together in your mind if they aren’t disinct, so I just assigned each kid an obsession.”

WHITMAN — The Board of Selectmen has voted to approve a town-wide vacation policy for municipal public employees. Employees may now carry over no more than nine vacation days, and is affected by collective bargaining agreements already in place.

Any days over the nine not used within a fiscal year will be forfeited.

Town Administrator Frank Lynam said during discussion on the issue Tuesday, Sept. 24. He said the new policy is not meant to affect people’s right to vacation time, but to encourage them to use it instead of carrying it over year after year.

“One of the issues that we’re addressing in the updated policy is the carry-over of vacation over the last few years,” said Lynam. “We have had financially significant payouts for accrued and unused vacation.”

The 4-0 vote — Selectmen Chairman Dr. Kowalski was absent from the meeting — came after months of discussion in executive session, because the policy included compensation issues that needed to be negotiated, according to Lynam.

“The nine days that we settled on is not arbitrary, it was the maximum vacation rollover in a collective bargaining agreement,” Selectman Justin Evans said.

Lynam said the new policy will mean meetings with “a couple of people who have far in excess of the nine days that will be permitted” under the new policy in an effort to help them use the time rather than lose it.

Lynam said that, in connection with the new policy, a vacation accrual line item will be in the next budget cycle to recognize the remaining vacation time liabilities.

In past years, he noted the town has had to pay out amounts exceeding the appropriation for the current and future plan. Lynam said the issue has been brought before the board a number of times.

“I’ve always felt, working 43 years at the same company that I worked for, that vacation time is very important and needs to be used,” said Selectman Vice Chairman Dan Salvucci. “You need to be able to divorce your mind from the job, rest your mind, get a vacation, enjoy your family — whatever it takes.”

He said not taking vacation time to roll over vacation pay is not the right thing to do for a person’s mental health.

“You need to take the time,” he said. “They need to understand that vacation time is there for a purpose and it’s there to relax your mind so that, when you come back, you can do a better job.”

The W-H School Committee, dismayed at the absence of a representative from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) at the Wednesday, Sept. 18 public hearing on the regional assessment method quizzed a school district attorney on the legal points surrounding the issue.

Hanson School Committee member Christopher Howard observed that the amended regional agreement’s funding formula seems to contradict the alternative/agreement method traditionally used by the district, and asked which takes precedence — the state’s new assessment regulation or the binding regional agreement.

School district lawyer Kevin Bresnahan said the existing regional agreement “does reflect an appropriate and allowable alternative assessment under the law and under the regulations,” as well as annual approval of a school budget constituting approval of the method. In any year that a budget is not approved by both towns and a district-wide meeting is needed, the regulations dictate that “the statutory method is the only can be used in that circumstance.”

“I would not be confident advising the committee that you could take a vote, given your existing regional agreement, to utilize the statutory method to calculate your initial budget without confirming that with [the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education] DESE,” Bresnahan said. He argued the committee could not put forth a statutory budget under the current terms of the regional agreement.

Bresnahan said “unanimous approval of the towns” means that all towns in a district must approve it, rather than a town meeting vote total.

“We can talk about changing that, but we need to follow that,” Howard said of the alternative funding method currently used.
Hanson Selectmen Chairman Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett spoke for her board, stating that the assessment formula has always been per-pupil within the regional agreement.

She also confirmed the regional agreement revocation article is on the Oct. 7 warrant as an effort to neutralize the issue and give people a chance to be thoughtful.

“We really did not comprehend — and I mean to the person — the change that was being made to the agreement and it fell upon the Board of Selectmen to do what we felt was right, to rescind the original vote … until such time as a different agreement is struct,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “We stand ready to do what is in the best interests of the citizens of Hanson. We look to the School Committee to make a decision about what your next move is going to be.”

She said any participation required from selectmen, the board is ready to help. “Throwing hand grenades over the wall at each other” is not going to help improve education.

“We have an answer about what’s happened in the past, the question is what do we do going forward,” said Whitman School Committee member Christopher Scriven. He arugued that, unless the regional agreement is changed, the statutory method should be used as DESE regulations stipulate, going forward.

Whitman Budget Override Evaluation Committee member Chris George noted that the handbook Finance Committees in both towns follow outlines that assessment calculations for regional district member towns should be calculated on a statutory basis, noting that the SJC has affirmed that education assessment methodology in the DESE regulation supersedes any individual regional school agreement. Districts may opt for an alternative formula, but it must be approved by member communities each year.

“To me it’s pretty clear,” he said. “The 1991 agreement is superseded by state law. The reason why? Because they changed the way they did state aid. Following the regional agreement as it’s stated does nothing except reallocate aid entitled to the residents of Whitman to the residents of Hanson — it’s that simple.”

Hanson resident Bruce Young said Chapter 71 governs regional school district budgets, which W-H has been following since 1991.

“What I find strange as a citizen and taxpayer is that DESE would make a ruling that, in spite of all these things, the majority town can hold out for a super-town meeting … and the town with the most voters can impose its will on the minority community,” Young said.

Whitman Finance Committee member Rosemary Connolly, said that last year no one knew what the statutory method was, and that voters in both towns thought the law was being followed when it wasn’t.

“Essentially, $1 million of welfare money was diverted over to Hanson, and that’s the truth of it,” she said. “It is state aid intended for poor students.”

Connolly said the alternative method is there for “compassion, not exploitation.”

Whitman resident Shawn Kain said that, if people in both towns dug their heels in, nothing will be solved.

“I think we need to find a compromise,” he said. “I think there could be a third way that would still be an alternative agreement, but could be a multi-year step one way or the other.”

Kain said neither community is in a position to absorb $1 million in their budgets.

“If people dig their heels in, it’s going to get ugly,” he said.

School Committee member Dawn Byers of Whitman, noted that South Shore Tech uses the statutory assessment formula and that DESE has that in mind for all regional districts.

“From my reading of the Education Reform Act, they want minimum local contribution to provide equity to all students,” she said. “They want all students to have the best opportunity to learn equal to their neighbor and all the neighboring towns and all the towns across Massachusetts.”

She said DESE recognizes different towns have different abilities to pay.

Small said Whitman is currently paying $3 million more than its minimum contribution, while Hanson is paying just to their minimum level.

Bresnahan said the 1991 agreement will have to stand until approved by both towns and approved by the commissioner of education.

“Clearly, there are considerations on both sides here that should be part of the discussion about whether the existing agreement should stay in place or be amended,” Bresnahan said. “I’m just trying to tell you how things stand now what the law requires and what has been allowed in the past.”

Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak said he would be calculating a budget based on the alternative method, because that is the formula in place.

“That’s where I feel our office did not provide accurate information for the committees and the selectmen to know there was another method,” he said. “People dropped the ball in our office and we are dealing with it.”

The situation has been distressing for School Committee members, as well.

“I can’t say this enough — I hate this entire conversation,” Howard said. “We’ve got to figure this out. I think everyone agrees, this is not going to move us forward as a district.”

He said a new regional agreement committee might be needed to do that. School Committee member Fred Small of Whitman agreed.

“We need to fix the problem and fix it fast,” Small said. “Our administration right now is spending way too much time worrying about this and taking its eye off the ball, which is educating kids.”

Szymaniak agreed.

“We haven’t done anything but this for almost a month and a half,” he said.

Whitman Finance Committee member David Codero commended Small for his comments, while disagreeing with one point on which Small had agreed with Young.

“Majority rule considered tyranny? There’s another word for it — it’s called democracy,” Codero said. “It’s a democratic procedure. For anyone to categorize it otherwise from the gallery? They’re wrong.”

While Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE) and West Nile virus (WNV) still pose a threat to many communities in Massachusetts, local officials have not yet recommended changes to outdoor event schedules.

EEE levels as categorized by The Mass. Department of Public Health include remote, low, moderate, high, and critical designations. Whitman is considered high while Hanson is in the moderate category.

Test samples of mosquitos in Whitman have tested positive for EEE over the summer and the risk level is high for EEE while low for WNV, according to the Mass. Department of Public Health. Hanson is listed as at moderate risk for EEE and low for WNV.

After consulting with the Whitman Board of Health, the Hanson Board of Health, Whitman Fire Chief Timothy Grenno and Hanson Deputy Fire Chief Rob O’Brien, on Thursday, Sept. 5, Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak recommended that there be no change to current outdoor evening activities in either town, including school activities and sports for the Whitman-Hanson Regional School District.

If any changes or modifications to after school outdoors activities is warranted, parents and residents will be notified immediately, Szymaniak said.

During this time of year, Szymaniak is recommending that families follow DPH guidelines in regard to wearing bug spray, long sleeved shirts and long pants while outdoors.

So far this season, 379 mosquito populations have tested positive for EEE and nine animals and four humans have been infected. A 59-year-old Bristol County woman has died from the virus while a man over 60 fell into a coma. Barnstable, Bristol, Essex, Franklin, Hampden, Hampshire, Middlesex, Norfolk, Plymouth and Worcester counties all have mosquito populations that have tested positive.

The threat of WNV is less with 61 mosquito populations testing positive and no animal or human cases to date. Risk categories for WNV are low, moderate, high, and critical. Both Whitman and Hanson are at low risk while neighboring Halifax and other South Shore communities are considered to be at moderate risk.

Aerial spraying to reduce mosquito populations was conducted in parts of Bristol and Plymouth Counties on Aug. 8 through12 and Aug. 22 through 25. The pesticide used is Anvil 10+10 which contains two ingredients: Sumithrin and Piperonyl butoxide.

“It should be noted that although the aerial spraying is considered necessary to reduce human risk, it will not eliminate risk,” the DPH stated on its website.

Preventive measures for those communities at critical risk include the recommendation that recreational outdoor activities held between dusk and dawn be canceled. For the week starting Sept. 8, dawn is considered 5:45 a.m. and dusk is considered 7:15 p.m.

With no existing vaccines or specific antiviral treatments for either EEE or WNV, the best preventative measures are those that decrease the likelihood of getting bit by mosquitos. Recommendations include wearing long pants and shirts, eliminating any standing water on your property, and wearing an EPA registered repellant with at least one of the following ingredients: DEET, Picaridin, IR3535, Oil of lemon eucalyptus (OLE), Para-menthane-diol (PMD), and 2-undecanone. Repellants are not recommended for infants under two months of age.

While rare, Massachusetts was second only to Florida in the number of EEE cases between 2009 and 2018. The incubation period for the disease is 4-10 days with some of those infected remaining asymptomatic. The systemic infection has an abrupt onset with some of the signs and symptoms including chills, fever, malaise, arthralgia, and myalgia.  In infants, onset of encephalitis is abrupt while in older children and adults, encephalitis starts within a few days of systemic illness. Signs and symptoms of encephalitis include fever, headache, irritability, restlessness, drowsiness, anorexia, vomiting, diarrhea, cyanosis, convulsions, and coma.

A third of those diagnosed with EEE will die while many that survive are left with secondary mental and physical impairments that are often disabling and progressive.

Residents with questions or concerns can contact their local boards of health — 781-618-9754  for Whitman and 781-293-3138 for Hanson.

Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak gave the Wednesday, Aug. 28 first day of school an A-minus, citing a minor sewage problem at WHRHS as the only noteworthy glitch in an otherwise smooth opening to the 2019-20 school year.

School Committee Chairman Bob Hayes noted a “few buses were late here and there” as parents photographed their children’s first day.

“Kids had smiles on their faces,” said Szymaniak, who visited every district school along with Assistant Superintendent George Ferro. “It was a great day. It was great to see kids.”

He said the high school’s sewage issue, which occurred at 2:30 p.m., Wednesday, was quickly repaired.

Szymaniak also said the open houses held at district schools were “all packed,” and noted Gary Pellitier is the interim principal at Indian Head School and will be introduced to the School Committee at a later meeting.

Faculty and staff attended a welcome back program Monday, Aug. 26 featuring speaker Mike Smith, a nonprofit entrepreneur and skateboarder, who brought a message of personal integrity and critical thinking.

“Mike’s not your typical presenter,” Szymaniak said, describing Smith’s long hair and penchant for wearing hats. “He just didn’t fit into the typical W-H teacher crowd. … But he had a captivated audience for about an hour — he’s phenominal and left a good message about how we should be teaching our kids.”

Szymaniak said Smith focused on character as the most important quality he looks for in potential employees. He also spoke of how the average college student is changing majors six or seven times before graduating just as they will likely change careers six or seven times during their working lives.

“It’s not the teach-to the textbook, it’s teach to the kid and he even said, ‘I don’t necessarily want the straight-A AP kid, who’s just textbook, cookie-cutter. I want the kid who’s a good person,’” Szymaniak said. “He really hit the social-emotional learning piece that we were trying to drive home. Of being a good person.”

Smith told educators that “I could teach a good person what I want them to learn, but I can’t teach them how to be not arrogant, how to be selfless and working with a team,” Szymaniak said. “I think he left a great message.”

SJ Services donated a catered lunch, cooked by facilities staff and an ice cream truck’s visit was donated by Collegiate Press.

As students prepare to return to school, Whitman Police Chief Scott Benton and Hanson Police Chief Michael Miksch would like to remind residents to follow several important safety tips.

“We encourage parents to have safety conversations with their kids before they go back to school,” Benton said. “This includes how to safely cross the street and how to be careful when getting on and off the bus.”

Whitman-Hanson Regional School District students return to class Wednesday, Aug. 28.

With students often on their phones texting, browsing the internet or playing games, the Whitman and Hanson Police Departments recommend that parents talk to their children about the following safety tips provided by the National Safety Council (NSC) when headed to and from school:

• Never walk while texting. If you need to respond to a text, move out of the way of others and stop on the sidewalk.

• Never cross the street while using an electronic device.

• Look left, right, then left again before crossing the street.

•  Cross only at crosswalks.

• Do not wear earbuds while walking across the street and stay alert.

Drivers should be on increased alert when traveling through school zones and should NEVER text and drive. Additionally, the NSC reminds operators to:

• Stop and yield to pedestrians crossing at a crosswalk or intersection.

• Never go around a school bus that has its lights activated and stop sign out.

• Always stop for a crossing guard holding up a stop sign.

• Take extra care to look out for children in school zones, near playgrounds and parks, and in all residential areas.

• Do not honk or rev your engine to scare a pedestrian, even if you have the right of way.

• Never pass a vehicle stopped for pedestrians.

To ensure that children who travel to school by bus get there safely, the Whitman and Hanson Police Departments advise that students follow these tips from the NSC:

• When waiting for the bus, stay away from traffic and avoid roughhousing or other behavior that can lead to carelessness.

• Line up away from the street as the bus approaches.

• Wait until the bus has stopped completely and the doors open before approaching.

Behavior on the bus:

• If available, always wear your seat belt.

• Don’t put your head, arms or hands out the window.

• Always wait for the bus to stop completely before getting up from your seat.

Getting off the bus:

• If you have to cross in front of the bus, walk at least 10 feet ahead until you can see the driver. Make sure the driver can see you too.

• Wait for a signal from the driver before crossing. When the driver signals, look left, right, then left again. Walk across the road and keep an eye out for sudden traffic changes.

• If your vision is blocked, move to an area where you can see other drivers and they can see you.

The return of classes also means that there will be many new teen drivers operating on the roads going to and from school.

According to the NSC, teen crashes occur most often because they are inexperienced. They may misjudge gaps in traffic, the right speed for road conditions and turning safely, among other things.

The Whitman and Hanson Police Departments, in conjunction with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, reminds parents to set rules before their kids hit the road with “5 to Drive:”

• NO cell phones while driving

• NO extra passengers

• NO speeding

• NO alcohol or drugs

• NO driving or riding without a seat belt

Statistically, half of all teens will be involved in a car crash before graduating from high school. Car crashes are the number one cause of death among teens, yet many crashes are preventable. Teens who continue to practice driving with their parents after obtaining their license increase their chances of avoiding a crash.

“A major part of driving safely in general is to not be a distracted driver. This is especially important during the school year,” Miksch said. “Drivers need to be able to give their full attention to school zones, buses and crosswalks. Anything that takes away from your attention on the road puts kids in danger.”

Benton and Miksch and the members of the Whitman and Hanson Police Departments would like to wish all students and faculty a fun and safe school year!