A REPORT CARD ON SCHOOL BUS SAFETY

AS PUBLISHED IN THE CONGRESSIONAL RECORD: August 2, 1996

Comments on the floor of the United States Senate by Mike DeWine, a United States Senator

Mr. DeWINE: Mr. President, I rise today to communicate some very good news to my colleagues in the Senate. The good news is about an issue that I have previously talked about on two or three occasions on the Senate floor, the issue of schoolbus safety.

Over the last year and a half, I have been working on an important problem affecting the safety of America's schoolchildren. Mr. President, tragically, since 1991, at least six children have died in accidents involving defective handrails on schoolbuses. Other children have been injured.

My interest in this issue, Mr. President, came about because of a horrible tragedy in my home county in Greene County, OH. A little girl by the name of Brandie Browder was killed. She was killed because of one of these defective handrails and because the drawstring from her clothing was caught on that handrail as she was trying to get off the bus. She was stuck there, and unfortunately the bus ultimately ran over her.

We have been working for the last year and a half on this particular problem. As I indicated, we have made some, I think, very, very important progress.

Mr. President, ever since I learned about these accidents, we have been trying to warn communities, schools, and parents in Ohio and across the country about this danger. We have publicized some methods for reducing the risk to children, such as a test we use in Ohio to determine whether a handrail is safe.

Mr. President, I have also chaired two Senate hearings--two Senate hearings--to investigate this problem. At the most recent of these hearings, this past April, we displayed this chart. I might say, Mr. President, to explain this for a moment, the question, does your State remove schoolbuses with dangerous handrails? This was the status as of April, the red being ``no,'' the States that did not deal with this problem; the yellow being states that were dealing with this problem. This was an interim report. If we would have gone back a year before that, we probably would have seen virtually every State in the Union in the red with a ``no.'' So this was the progress as of April. You can see, Mr. President and Members of the Senate, at that time there were still at least 15 States that had these dangerous buses on the road.

Since that time I have been working with both my colleagues in the Senate and directly with officials in these States to see what we can do to fix this problem. We have come a long way. I am glad to announce today, that as of today, as you can see in this new chart, all States except one--all States except one--are taking active measures to get schoolbuses with defective handrails off the road.

Mr. President, as we approach a new school year, it is my hope that the last remaining State, the State of Georgia, will follow suit and will do this by the beginning of the school year. I have been working with Senator Coverdell to bring this issue to the attention of the relevant officials in Georgia. We certainly hope that Georgia will take action soon.

Mr. President, we are close to a solution on the issue of defective handrails. I am encouraged by the cooperation I have received from my colleagues in this Chamber, and I want to help them for all the help they have given my office over the last year and a half. Let me stress that schoolbuses are already the very safest mode of transportation. They should be, because they carry the most precious asset that any of us have, and that is our children.

Mr. President, we do have to do everything we can to make them even safer. That is why I will continue to work on other areas of the schoolbus safety issue. But on this issue, Mr. President, we are very, very close to solving the problem. If we can continue working together in this effective, bipartisan manner, I expect to make a great deal more progress on school bus safety in the months ahead.

I thank the Chair and yield the floor.