High Fuel Prices Force School
Districts to Make Choices
High fuel prices have school districts across the country looking for ways to pinch pennies in order to pay for the cost to operate their school bus fleets.
With diesel rates higher than anticipated, price spikes brought on by hurricanes Katrina and Rita and increased ridership in some area due to the cost of fuel for passenger cars, 2005-06 school budget deficit projections are reaching hundreds of thousands of dollars in some districts.
To make up some of the difference, transportation departments are adopting anti-idling policies, paring down or eliminating field trips and extra-curricular activities, consolidating bus routes and even cutting back to a four-day school week.
Most districts in Mississippi , which transports more than 400,000 students on 7,000 public school buses daily, were not affected by a fuel shortage after the hurricanes due to pre-planning and decreased need resulting from school closures, said Leonard C. Swilley, Sr., state director of pupil transportation for the Mississippi Department of Education. Still, he said, the continuous rise in diesel fuel prices has most districts concerned.
"The majority of districts are evaluating their transportation programs daily for additional ways the district can make adjustments to offset fuel costs that had not been included in their budget," Swilley said.
For Jackson County Public Schools located southeast of Lexington-Fayette in Kentucky , that means trimming the school week down to four days starting on Oct. 17 and ensuring that the state-mandated 1,050 hours of instruction are fulfilled by lengthening school hours. During the first month of the current school year, fuel cost the district approximately $28,000 more than compared to the same time last year, said director of pupil personnel John Smith.
Others, like Katonah-Lewisboro School District in Westchester County , N.Y. , have no definite plans for recovering the excess cost of operating their school bus fleets.
"As of right now, the district hasn't taken a position on how we are going to fund the deficit," said Transportation Supervisor Jim Minihan. "We are looking at a $120,000 shortfall in our fuel budget this year."
For the moment, Katonah-Lewisboro is asking school principals to evaluate the need for field trips and extra curricular actives that require school bus transportation, he said.
The remedies most districts have employed are temporary, and the savings won't match the cost of diesel that averaged $2.52 per gallon according to a recent fuel survey, said National School Transportation Association industry specialist Robin Leeds.
"These are clearly emergency measures, but they are not long-term solutions," she said. "It's a real dilemma, and in the end, the only thing that is really going to make a difference is more money."
The Ontario School Bus Association, which calculated a shortfall of at least $2.8 million for the month of September, has asked for government help in the form of transportation grants adjusted monthly to reflect fluctuating fuel prices.
Virtually none of the respondents to NSTA's survey indicated that their state has increased transportation subsidies, leaving districts like Boston Public School , which anticipates a $500,000 to $600,000 deficit in their fiscal year 2006 fuel account, with vague answers on how to address the program.
"School districts are going to need help from the state and federal level to deal with this issue," said Rich Jacobs, Boston 's director of transportation. "We do not want to be placed in a position of compromising student safety by eliminating transportation services."
The balancing act between efficiency and safety is concerning due to the potential of undoing years of work if districts have to reduce their school bus service forcing students to walk to school or drive themselves, said Peter Mannella, executive director of the New York Association for Pupil Transportation.
"If there are things we need to do to reduce the costs of running the buses that cuts into two decades or more of building safety systems, what will we have gained?" he said.
Source: School Transportation News, November 2005. All rights reserved.
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