In order to address chronic losses associated with the public-school student transportation program, the state Board of Education is proposing doubling the round-trip school bus fare from 50 cents to $1. With public hearings set across the state this month
In order to address chronic losses associated with the public-school student transportation program, the state Board of Education is proposing doubling the round-trip school bus fare from 50 cents to $1.
With public hearings set across the state this month and next, and schools opening up for the 2002-03 school year in July and August, it’s unlikely that any increase will take effect by the start of the new school year, according to a state Department of Education spokesman.
The Kaua’i public hearing is Tuesday, May 21, at 6:30 p.m. at the Wilcox Elementary School cafeteria in Lihu’e.
Any proposed increase, which would technically be an amendment to Hawaii Administrative Rules, requires approval by both the BOE and Gov. Ben Cayetano.
“It’s a ways down the road before anything would be fully in effect,” said Greg Knudsen, DOE spokesman.
“We are running a deficit, and we’re concerned about where we’re going to come up with the extra money needed to cover the loss the program is now accruing,” he said.
That loss is projected to be $2.8 million in the current school year, and without a fare increase could likely approach $4 million in the 2002-03 school year, said Cynthia Kawachi, acting student transportation services manager for the DOE.
Doubling the fare will not totally erase the deficit, but it will help, she said.
Public-school student bus fares haven’t been raised since 1995, when the hike was from 10 cents to the current 25 cents per one-way trip.
The Kaua’i County Council at one time provided a subsidy to keep fares low on Kaua’i, where around 1,500 youngsters board buses weekdays. Now only Maui’s County Council still provides a subsidy, 10 cents per rider per trip, Kawachi said.
The BOE has scheduled 13 public hearings from May 14 to June 17 on the bus-fare increase, and another proposal which would allow families to pre-pay student bus fares for school quarters, giving parents discounts and students passes they would use in lieu of cash to board buses.
A pass system is envisioned to eliminate what the BOE calls “the overt identification of fare-free student riders and thereby their family’s low-income status.” Currently, paying riders give the driver their 25 cents each time they board a bus, while those students from low-income families show a pass and board free.
Kaua’i and the other Neighbor Islands, at least as the rules are now drafted, will be exempt from a proposal which would also alter distances fare-free students live from schools to qualify for bus rides.
That proposed amendment would change the eligibility criteria for fare-free riders by increasing the qualifying distance from home to school for middle or intermediate school students on O’ahu from one mile to 1.5 miles, and for high school students on O’ahu from one mile to two miles.
The qualifying distance for elementary school students on O’ahu and students of all grades on the Neighbor Islands would remain one mile.
Staff Writer Paul C. Curtis can be reached at mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net or 245-3681 (ext. 224).
