DENVER — Colorado’s proposed bill requiring lap/shoulder belts on school buses last week joined others in the graveyard of failed school bus bills for 2009.

The House Committee on Education unanimously voted to indefinitely postpone the measure, which would have required all new buses to be equipped with lap/shoulder seat belts starting July 1, 2010. The measure carried no additional funding. Texas passed a similar law in 2007 without funding, and the state continues to grapple with the issue with its own 2010 compliance date looming. California is the only other state with a law requiring the lap/shoulder restraints on school buses.

Bruce Little, Colorado's state director of pupil transportation, had earlier estimated that it would cost between $7,000 and $20,000 per bus to equip each of the 6,080 school buses in the state. He said the prospect of passing this cost onto already cash-strapped schools ultimately won the committee over.

Testimony by the mother of a boy killed in a 1989 school bus crash appeared to have earlier moved members of a senate transportation committee. But Little pointed out that this was the only death in the bus that had occurred in the last 20 years. Before that, a fatality had not occurred for an additional 20 years, Little noted.

Little said some of the committee members indicated they wanted the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to take a greater lead on the issue. But in Little's opinion, NHTSA already has by leaving the decision to install lap/shoulder belts on large buses up to individual states and municipalities.

As a state leader, his role is to provide the information schools need to make that call, adding that he believes he has.

"Hopefully, that informs them that they do not need it ... irrespective of cost."