Chicago’s crossing guards are now under CPS management. The district says it’s improved the program, yet there are dozens of vacant corners.

With less than a month until school starts, Chicago Public Schools is looking to fill some 75 crossing guard vacancies around the city — about 10% of the unit entrusted with shepherding kids safely to school.

This is only the second summer CPS has been in charge of this task. Chicago’s crossing guards were managed by the Chicago Police Department for decades, then by the city Office of Emergency Management and Communications from 2016 until CPS took the reins in January 2021. The district said the move was part of an effort to consolidate student safety supports under one umbrella.

Safety and Security Chief Jadine Chou said CPS welcomed its new responsibilities, as it has benefited schools and crossing guards. The district uses its relationships with Local School Councils, parents, elected officials and community groups to recruit for specific corners, Chou said, and the crossing guards are eligible to receive CPS benefits and to work in schools between their brief morning and afternoon shifts.

Still, some say coverage problems have persisted through the shift in oversight from OEMC to CPS. Even more, this transfer of power may offer a glimpse into how the district and the city separate their operations as Chicago moves toward an elected school board. An independent review of the district’s finances and entanglements with the city is due by Oct. 31.

“It’s not about who owns what,” Chou said, “as much as it is making sure that we’re all in partnership and making sure that there is role clarity as well as synergy on mission.”

Long before CPS took control of the crossing guard unit, the police department and the city struggled to fill vacancies at intersections.

“City police seeking gal crossing guards for duty in the fall” was the headline of a July 1973 Chicago Tribune story. Interested applicants had to pass a crossing guard exam administered by the Civil Service Commission. Hourly pay ranged from $2.97 to $3.98, and the police department provided a $150 yearly allowance for uniforms.

The police were in charge until it was revealed in the 2016 city budget that about 900 crossing guard positions would move to OEMC. The transition was said to free up sworn police officers from having to backfill crossing guard vacancies that arose throughout the school year.

Some crossing guards balked at the change, expressing concern about losing their fixed work schedules and their police badge and patch. The uniform helps deter troublemaking, guards said at the time.

Chou said uniform adjustments were one of the first things CPS tackled when it took control of the unit while students were still learning from home because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Guards “used to be with CPD, so a lot of them still wear the CPD-like uniform. These uniforms have to be dry cleaned, and they’re kind of stiff. They’re polyester, kind of warm on a day like today,” Chou said. “We got some feedback from many people (saying), ‘We’d like to consider something maybe a little bit more modern.’”

Chou said the new outfit is a polo shirt and khakis, but some guards still wanted to keep the longtime uniform. CPS said that’s fine, but all guards have to wear their district ID and high-visibility vest.

Chou said CPS also changed the way guards are assigned, to promote stability. New hires are recruited for specific intersections. Longtime workers can bid for a vacant post in July — ahead of the new school year, with priority given to seniority — or they can stay put. If a plum vacancy emerges during the school year, a guard is not allowed to swap his or her post for that one.

Consistency is key to these positions, Chou said, so relationships can be forged with students, parents and school employees. Chou gave an example of a guard she said stopped a child abduction in the spring by summoning the child after observing suspicious behavior. The guard was able to note information about the person’s car as well, Chou said, and the district plans to honor the guard soon.

Stacia Scott — executive vice president of SEIU Local 73, which represents the CPS crossing guards — said they are “integral to the school community and keeping kids safe. So when we don’t have those positions filled, it does create a greater risk.”

CPS said there were around 135 vacancies in the 723-position unit when the district took over last year, which Chou blamed on normal attrition and not the transition to CPS oversight. There were 76 vacancies as of July 12, according to CPS. Hourly pay starts at $15.46.

District figures show CPS budgeted no crossing guard positions for the fiscal year that began in July 2020, and ended that year in June 2021 with 740 positions. CPS said it received tax increment financing surplus funds to cover the $5.2 million cost of the guards for the first six months of the changeover.

The district allocated $16.6 million for the crossing guard program and its 739 positions for the coming school year.

Crossing guards no longer have to take a civil service exam, but they are required to undergo a background check and meet other CPS hiring criteria. Chou said vacancies are often concentrated on the North, West and Northwest sides and not on the South Side.

“I have no causation for that,” Chou said. “But I do know that we are closing that vacancy gap.”

This would be welcome news at schools that have struggled to staff corners, such as William C. Goudy Technology Academy in Uptown. Local School Council member Nick Ward said Goudy administrators performed crossing guard duties some mornings during the last school year until the position was filled.

“We noticed in the fall that the lack of crossing guards was a major issue. Compounded with that is there’s been redevelopment of the Red Line up here, a Red-Purple Line modernization project, which has just made traffic a little challenging in certain locations,” said Ward, who plans a run for 48th Ward alderman.

Chou said she wants to work with the Chicago Department of Transportation to study potential improvements to hazardous corners that could include better signage, traffic light changes and more prominent street markings.

Child pedestrian fatalities have been top of mind this summer with the June deaths of 2-year-old Raphael “Rafi” Cardenas, who was riding a mini-scooter across a Lincoln Square street; and 11-year-old Ja’lon James, who was crossing a Lawndale street. Neither were leaving or going to school buildings when drivers struck them.

Chou said crossing guards can contact her safety and security team with concerns about their intersection, and the team works with CDOT to fix any issues.

“I would like to be even more proactive than that,” Chou said. “Before waiting for a crossing guard to make that overture, to reach out to us, I would like to really do some studies with CDOT to understand, where do we have traffic concerns? I know they do these studies, but how do we really converge our efforts?”

Bill Sullivan said he became a crossing guard in November after semi-retiring from his work as a nonprofit manager. He was stationed at the corner of 56th Street and St. Louis Avenue and expects to return to that Southwest Side post in the fall. He raised concerns to the Tribune about CPS’ oversight of the program, saying the district was unable to find a substitute for him when he took his eight personal days over the last year.

“You know that anytime you take time off, you feel guilty that no one’s covering your post,” Sullivan said.

He said he has not met his supervisor in person — but he has encountered other supervisors while undergoing training. Most supervision is done over email, Sullivan said. There were 18 supervisors assigned to the crossing guard program in 2020 when it was managed by OEMC, though these supervisors held responsibilities beyond program oversight, according to CPS. Under the district, there are four crossing guard supervisors and a program manager.

“That’s part of the change. For better or for worse, we’ve gotten our crossing guards into technology solutions,” Chou said, adding that crossing guards can meet with their supervisor on a video conferencing platform if necessary.

“If the feedback comes from our crossing guards that we need an adjustment to our structure, we obviously want to hear that, and we’ll take that into account. I think my main thing is, are people doing OK? Are people doing what they need to be doing?” Chou said. “We’ve only been in this a little over a year — not very long — and every day we’re working to make it better.”

CPS crossing guards also support private schools. Matthew Walter, chief operating officer for Catholic Schools, said the Archdiocese of Chicago maintains a closer relationship with CPS than it did with OEMC.

“I think one of the things that CPS has done fairly well is they’ll keep us in the loop if there is a challenge that they’re having in staffing a position at a location,” said Walter, a former CPS budget director. “We were largely at the Archdiocesan-level unaware of those (challenges) prior to this, so they do keep us in the loop a little bit more. But other than that, I haven’t really noticed much difference.”

The transfer of control of the crossing guard unit was raised at the May Chicago Board of Education meeting by board member Elizabeth Todd-Breland, who was appointed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot in 2019. The board was discussing contributing more than usual to the Municipal Employees’ Annuity and Benefit Fund of Chicago.

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Before 2020, the city assumed the entirety of the payment made on behalf of CPS’ nonteaching employees to the municipal fund. The district reimbursed the city $60 million the first two years and $100 million in the fiscal year that just ended June 30.

After much discussion, the board recently approved a payment of $175 million for the coming school year, which the district said represents 66% of the city contribution requirement for CPS employees.

“In our time on this board, the city of Chicago has shifted over as new expenses to CPS, school resource officers, crossing guards, Safe Passage and (the municipal employees’ benefits fund). Now, I don’t dispute that these are things being used in our schools. The problem is, you give us new expenses, and we have no ability to get new revenue for it,” Todd-Breland said at the May meeting.

“The city is creating a structural deficit or exacerbating our own structural deficit at CPS by shifting expenses to CPS without a (memorandum of understanding) or something in writing about how this will be paid for because, you know, the COVID money is accounted for.”

CPS is on track to spend about $2.8 billion in federal COVID-19 relief money over six fiscal years, ending in the fall of 2024. The district has said this money has been allocated to help students recover from the pandemic.

The Illinois State Board of Education has until July 2023 to review the Chicago Board of Education financial report and make recommendations to the General Assembly on the board’s ability to operate with the financial resources available to it. The first wave of elected school board members are slated to be seated in 2025.

tswartz@tribpub.com