STUDY WILL EXAMINE TRANSPORTATION NEEDS

JACKSON -- The Cape Girardeau County Commission Monday heard officials describe a study that will determine how the county's public transportation needs can best be served.

Currently, the county's public transportation needs are met by a variety of agencies that provide uncoordinated transportation for handicapped and senior citizens.

The study will examine all current funding sources and services and devise a plan that will coordinate the services. The purpose of the plan is to improve the efficiency of the services while saving taxpayer dollars by eliminating duplication of services.

Barbara Stribling, chairperson of the Community Caring Council and its Transportation Committee, and Ellie Knight, director of the Retired Senior Volunteer Program for Cape Girardeau and Scott counties and a member of the Transportation Committee, told the commission the study had been endorsed by the board of directors of the Community Caring Council.

Knight was instrumental in implementing a plan in Scott County that coordinates transportation for the various agencies.

"The situation in Cape Girardeau County now is fragmented," she said. "People can't get access to transportation services when and where they need them.

"We're after improved transportation for everyone who needs it. In Scott County now, in addition to senior citizens, we are transporting the mentally and physically handicapped, little kids to day care and young adults to get their GED and then to get to jobs when they need it."

Knight said that Cape Girardeau County will have better services when all its resources are coordinated.

"My vision," said Knight, "is that pooling all our transportation resources will maximize not only our services but also the use of our tax dollars."

Presiding Commissioner Gerald Jones said he became interested in the plan last fall when he heard about five elderly women from Delta who couldn't get transportation to the doctor and back. From that point, Jones said, he wanted the commission to see what it could do to improve the transportation situation in the county.

"We're not trying to take them to the movies," said Jones. "We're trying to get them to the doctor and the grocery store and other necessary places."

Jones said the issue of the county's transportation needs began with concern for senior citizens but has expanded to the physically and economically disadvantaged.

Thomas G. Tucker, executive director of the Southeast Missouri Regional Planning and Economic Development Commission, will conduct the study with a grant from the Missouri Department of Transportation. He said that prospects for the plan are very promising.