MOUNT VERNON — Not only are school transportation budgets adversely affected by the rising cost of bus fuel, the actual costs of buses is rising while the state reimbursement is dwindling.
Jon Mason, treasurer for Highland Local Schools, said that in 2001 the state provided about $40.7 million, statewide, for school bus purchases. In 2004 that amount was cut by more than one-half, and for fiscal year 2008 Gov. Ted Strickland cut the bus purchase subsidy from $14 million to $8,871,862 by executive order.
Mason said seven or eight years ago Highland received enough from the state to fund one bus per year, Now, he said, Highland gets enough for about one-third of a bus. “We try to replace one to two buses each year,” Mason said, “just to keep up with an average fleet age of about 10 years. Our buses travel about 2,600 miles per day — enough to drive to California and make it back to Las Vegas.”
Mason said the price of diesel fuel alone will limit the district’s bus replacement to one or none unless something changes.
Mount Vernon City Schools transportation secretary Diane Zolman said her district tries to replace two of the 30 buses in the fleet every year. The vehicles range in age from model year 1988 to 2008, and one of the buses has 315,000 miles on it.
“We have excellent in-house mechanics,” Zolman said, “who help us keep going safely longer. Our buses travel about 475,000 miles a year, counting regular routes and extracurricular trips.”
New buses, with new emissions requirements, cost about $75,000 apiece. Mount Vernon received roughly $28,000 in bus-purchase subsidies in 2005; the 2008 estimate is around $5,000 per bus.
Danville didn’t receive any reimbursement the last time the district bought a bus, and treasurer Mary Payne said they received $3,100 this year. She said she remembers when the state would reimburse 50 percent of the cost if a bus was 10 years old and/or had over 100,000 miles on it. Now, she said, the district replaces buses only when absolutely necessary — when the state highway patrol says they won’t pass inspection.
Payne said many of the roads in the district are rural stone and dirt roads, which adds to the deterioration of the buses, even though they travel “only” about 71,000 miles a year combined.
Data from the Ohio Department of Education indicate the other school districts in the area are in similar straits.
