Kaysville parents who pleaded with the Davis County Board of Education to restore busing for routes they consider hazardous hit a roadblock Tuesday night when district officials told them they would be unable to change the situation this school year.
The area in question surrounds Kaysville Elementary, 50 N. 100 East, which parents say poses threats to their children who must walk to school. The district decided recently not to have hazardous busing there. Hazardous routes are those considered to pose dangers to students but are close enough to the school that there wouldn't be busing otherwise.Three sets of railroad tracks, a park-and-ride, freeway on- and off-ramps without lights and streets without sidewalks are part of the Kaysville route, said Todd Tyler, a spokesman for about 12 parents at the meeting.
"And you don't consider that hazardous?" he asked the board.
Louenda Downs, board president, said the board does recognize the parents' concerns but that money restraints do not allow all schools to have buses for hazardous routes.
"We have to take these things that rip at your heartstrings and have to take the budget and make a marriage that's not always going to be pleasing," she said. "There are compelling routes that trouble me as a board member throughout the district that make me want to write out checks, but we have to be responsible to the taxpayer, too."
The district has a fund of about $900,000 for hazardous busing, some activities and additional buses.
Assistant Superintendent Lynn Trenbeath said the schools request hazardous routes (as Kaysville did) and then the district and a transportation committee review the requests before awarding busing. Because all requests are reviewed at the same time, she said, the district could not act on Kaysville's appeal and provide a route after the decision has already been made. The district has 32 hazardous routes.
"In terms of getting any more routes, I think it would be very difficult," she said.
"But you can't cancel busing without putting in place some options," Tyler countered.
Board member Dan Eastman said carpooling to give children rides to school is one way to alleviate the problem. "There's nothing in the statutes saying school districts are required to take students to school," he added.
Tyler said parents were not told about the busing issue in time to coordinate their children's tracks (on year-round school) so that they could also organize carpools. Some year-round tracks begin July 26.
Board members told Tyler and the other parents they would help them however they could but that a route was not financially feasible.
"We're in this all together," Eastman said. "We want to fund every route we can, we really do, but we can't provide transportation to every student who needs a ride."