The Washington state House of Representatives passed a bill Monday, April 14, that provides flexibility to schools struggling to fund transportation for their students.
The Senate approved changes made to the bill in the House a few days later before sending it to Gov. Bob Ferguson for approval. He has not yet signed it into law.
Senate Bill 5009, sponsored by Sen. John Braun, R-Centralia, encourages school districts to use a vehicle that best suits their needs, in part, by removing language that made traditional school buses the only vehicle eligible for a variety of state student transportation funding.
During a public hearing on the bill in the House Committee on Appropriations, superintendents from across the state as well as representatives for the Eastern Washington Schools Quality Coalition and the Rural Education Center testified in support of the bill, citing its potential to help the schools face challenges to providing student transportation.
Those challenges include a broad shortage of qualified bus drivers and remote bus routes.
“Many rural districts have the big yellow school buses that travel hundreds of miles,” Marie Sulivan, a representative for the Eastern Washington Schools Quality Coalition, said. “This bill recognizes that a smaller vehicle might be a better approach on a three mile long dirt road, to pick up five kids.”
Washington schools are responsible for providing transportation to all eligible students to and from school, including those enrolled in special education programs, and the state funds that transportation through the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. But for years the bulk of that funding has been limited to funding or reimbursing expenses and travel expenses associated exclusively with traditional school buses.
The new law, however, extends funding streams to support non-bus passenger vehicles by including students that are picked up by non-bus passenger vehicles in funding allocation models and by including non-bus vehicles in the state reimbursement program that helps districts pay for the purchasing and upkeep of transportation vehicles.
Throughout the hearing process, the bill was frequently labeled a “common sense” change by those testifying. The Legislature has looked at similar bills in previous years but none of them have made it out before the deadline.
Superintendent Robert Maxwell from the Pullman School District pointed out that similar types of passenger vehicles are already used by many schools to transport students to extracurricular activities and are regulated similarly to school buses.
“Vehicles such as vans and Suburbans are already inspected annually by the Washington State Patrol and commonly used to transport students to sporting events, club events,” Maxwell said. “They could be more broadly utilized during driver shortages to help ensure that students arrive safely and on time.”
Aspects of the bill also directly address the issues of driver shortage in its change to the licensing requirements for drivers.
Training requirements for school bus drivers remain in place, and those drivers must have a commercial license, but drivers who will only ever operate non-bus passenger vehicles will not be required to maintain a commercial license, effectively lowering the requirements for training needed to transport students in many situations.
