How Much Money Per Student Does A County Get For Busses

School buses © AP

Some school districts are billing parents for bus service to offset upkeep shortfalls. The motility has angered parents in some communities and worried some schoolhouse officials, who are concerned most children'south safety and admission to education. (AP)

Information technology used to be that when children hopped onto a yellowish school coach to get to and from their classes, taxpayers picked up the tab.

But cash-strapped schoolhouse districts in at to the lowest degree five states are now request parents to pay for school bus service, ofttimes to offset budget deficits.

"It'due south a trend that started back in '08 when the recession hitting," said Dan Domenech, executive director of AASA, The School Superintendents Association. "School districts' budgets were cut back severely. As an alternative to cutting a lot of programs, districts went the route of charging fees for sports events, uniforms, afterward-schoolhouse activities—and eventually transportation."

State funding for education has declined during the concluding vii years. A study in October by the Center on Upkeep and Policy Priorities, a Washington research group, found that at to the lowest degree 30 states were providing less funding per educatee final yr than they did before the recession. Fourteen of the states cutting that funding by 10 percent or more. Nationwide, school districts receive virtually 45 per centum of their funding from the state. Local authorities contributes about the same percent.

The move to accuse for bus transportation has angered parents in some communities and worried some school officials about children'south safety and access to education.

"When the budget hammer drops on pupil transportation, information technology's normally children and their parents who take the striking. That'southward just really unfortunate and a shame," said Mike Martin, executive director of the National Clan for Pupil Transportation, which represents school transportation directors.

Martin said that most school districts don't typically charge bus fees to make coin; they do information technology to recoup for or offset a upkeep shortfall.

"It'south being driven by the budget challenges we've had in the last decade," Martin said. "Information technology's been happening more than and more than."

Charabanc Fees Vary

California and Massachusetts are among the states where some districts are billing parents for coach service. In Hawaii, the education department runs the country'southward unmarried school commune and charges for passenger vehicle transportation.

Fees vary from district to district. The Jeffco Public Schools in Golden, Colorado, for example, charge $150 a kid per twelvemonth. Students in grades 7 through 12 in Franklin, Massachusetts, pay $325 each, with a cap of $975 per family. And the Poway Unified School District in San Diego County, California, bills $575 a twelvemonth per child, with a cap of $ane,437 for three or more children.

For years, schoolhouse districts in a number of states have been charging parents for transportation as a convenience if they live within a certain distance from school, often two miles or less. Those who live farther away traditionally have gotten gratuitous motorcoach service.

But shrinking budgets and college transportation costs have pushed some districts to charge fifty-fifty if the students live far abroad.

For the Murrieta Valley Unified School District in southern California, billing for bus service is a financial necessity, said Barbara Ortiz-Monson, the district'southward transportation manager.

"Our district is one of the lowest-funded districts in the state of California," she said. "Information technology costs $three.5 million a year to run the transportation program. The state merely gives u.s.a. $86,000."

The Murrieta Valley district doesn't provide bus service to high school students who live inside three miles of schoolhouse. For eye school students, the boundary is ii miles; for elementary students it's one. Parents of students living farther away who want bus service must pay for information technology.

The fees are $395 a year for the outset child in a family unit, $365 for the 2d and $335 for each boosted child, for a maximum of $i,095 a year.

Final year, the commune took in nearly $280,000 from autobus passes, according to Ortiz-Monson. "It's a drop in the bucket when we're looking at $3.5 one thousand thousand," she said.

School districts don't charge if students are disabled and qualify for transportation or are foster children or homeless. Some also offer discounted or costless service to low-income families.

Ortiz-Monson said about a third of the about 1,600 students who use school transportation in her district ride for free because they are low income.

"Our lath believes in transporting as many every bit they tin can," she said.

Parent Pushback

No one keeps information on the number of schoolhouse districts that bill parents for bus service. But a 2011 report by the Florida Legislature'south Office of Programme Assay & Government Accountability establish that 12 states allowed districts to charge parents fees to ship their children to school. A 13th land, Hawaii, required parents to pay. Nineteen states prohibited such fees and the residuum hadn't established policies.

Most states that did allow fee-based school bus transportation gave schoolhouse districts the authorization to make up one's mind whether to practise so and how much to accuse.

The study found that districts reported some "negative consequences" as a event of charging for transportation, including declining ridership and parent complaints. Some schools experienced more traffic congestion because parents decided to bulldoze their children to school rather than pay.

Michelle Winzent, president of the Colorado PTA, said those findings band true in her state.

"Parents here in Colorado are feeling like they are being nickeled and dimed, period. Technology fees, volume fees, athletic fees, and now double-decker fees. It's really outrageous," Winzent said. "Information technology'southward likewise creating these horrific traffic issues at the schools because everyone is driving and picking upwards their kids."

Some officials worry that charging bus fees besides creates barriers to attendance for children whose families tin't beget to pay for bus service and can't detect culling transportation. Some districts that bill parents don't have family income into consideration.

"That definitely is a problem. Information technology's an inequity issue," said Domenech of the schoolhouse superintendents association. "That is why it's such a hard decision for districts to make. Whether you're charging fees for books or equipment or transportation, it'due south the children eligible for gratuitous and reduced lunch who are hurt by it."

Charlie Hood, executive director of the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services, said school buses provide "unparalleled safety," and that whatever policy that reduces the number of riders will upshot in some children using less safe means to get to classes.

"Local and state policymakers should exist aware of the facts regarding school jitney transportation and counterbalance the potential for unintended consequences," Hood said in an e-mail.

Some Parent Support

Parents don't e'er oppose the concept of paying for school coach service.

At the Douglas County School Commune in Colorado, for example, parents were supportive of a program launched five years ago that charges fees, but likewise uses a real-time GPS tracking system to monitor students on the bus, said transportation managing director Donna Grattino.

"We began charging fees to beginning the cost of providing safety and security to students," Grattino said. "We're a large district that covers over 900 square miles. Some stops are 26 miles from the schoolhouse. Information technology's imperative to see where a pupil is and what bus they're on and be able to rail that, and parents recognized the value of that."

The district charges $150 a year or 50 cents a ride for coach service. It receives about $one.9 million a year from the fees – merely about 12 percent of the total cost of transporting students, Grattino said.

Domenech of the school superintendents group said he hopes that as the economic system continues to amend, districts that accept been charging fees will begin offering free transportation once again.

"We're short-changing our children when we don't provide the necessary funding for their didactics," he said.

Source: https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2015/6/16/school-districts-are-billing-parents-for-bus-rides

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