May River High senior warns board that single entrance creates daily gridlock, safety risks

Andrew Morissette, a May River High School senior, urged the Beaufort County School Board on March 3 to address chronic traffic congestion at the school's single entrance, describing daily backups and potential emergency-response delays.

"Every day on my way to school, I'm stopped dead around a mile and a half away from the school," Morissette said in public comment, describing stop-and-go traffic that he said "never exceed[s] 15 miles per hour" and can cause dismissals to take more than 40 minutes for students on the far side of campus. He warned the problem will worsen with a new elementary school in the area and said congestion could delay ambulances or law-enforcement response in a time-sensitive incident.

Morissette outlined a potential partial solution: creating an alternate connection through Palmetto Bluff that would require limited paving and tree clearing, a change he said would improve daily flow for students, staff and community members. He said Palmetto Bluff previously declined to open access but noted he sees workers from that area stuck in the same backups he experiences.

In response, Board member Smith supported the concern and asked the superintendent to have operations staff assess the situation and report back to the board. The chair said the request would be captured as a future agenda item.

What the board recorded The board did not vote on a policy change; members agreed to request a staff report to operations to assess traffic flow, alternative access options and public-safety implications. No engineering studies or cost estimates were read into the record; Morissette described traffic delays and a possible local connection but did not provide a formal proposal with vendor or cost details.

Next steps The superintendent's office was asked to prepare an operations assessment for board consideration at a future meeting.