A task force assembled by Governor Dewine has released its school bus safety report. The report makes 17 recommendations to improve school bus safety, but stops short of recommending mandatory seat belts.
Accident Prompts Calls for Action
A deadly accident in October of 2023 prompted calls to mandate seat belts on school buses. Lawmakers and advocates called for action after a Honda Odyssey minivan struck a school bus with 53 passengers, killing 11-year-old Aiden Clark. Ohio state representative Cecil Thomas reintroduced a bill to mandate seat belts on buses,
“We got to re-energize the interest in trying to do whatever we can as a state to minimize the possibility of children, of a mother getting a phone call or mother in the past getting a phone call regarding a child that’s been killed in a bus accident.”
In response, Governor Dewine assembled a task force to study the issue. It released a detailed report with several key findings. Neither Dewine nor the task force recommended mandating seat belts.
Working Group’s Findings
According to Cleveland.com, DeWine shared that the group, considered the experience Avon Lake City Schools had when it purchased two new buses with seat belts for the 2019-2020 school year. The district found that logistical hassles associated with seatbelts outweighed the potential enhanced safety they promised.
Steve Dackin, director of the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, the state’s new K-12 agency says that a 78-passenger school bus these days runs around $120,000 with an additional $19,000 for seat belts and $13,000 for the other recommended features.
DeWine said he’d like the state to help pay for many of the features on new buses or perhaps almost-new buses. He plans to include a line item for funding in the next state budget, but also plans to speak with legislators about finding more immediate sources of funding for these changes.
The working group’s full recommendations were:
- School districts should identify, share and encourage bus drivers to participate in professional development opportunities.
- DEW should work with the Department of Public Safety to create and offer wellness programming specific to school bus drivers. School districts should develop policies to ensure drivers can take advantage of this support.
- School districts should develop driver performance review policies and conduct annual performance evaluations.
- DEW should require and provide a curriculum for six hours of annual bus training.
- The Department of Public Safety and DEW should partner to expand advanced driver training for school bus drivers.
- DEW should adopt rules requiring districts to offer school bus safety orientation to students, parent and guardians at the beginning of each school year.
- The Ohio State Highway Patrol should collaborate between state and local law enforcement partners to develop police training on school bus inspections and the most common safety risks for student passengers.
- The Department of Public Safety should develop educational materials and wide-ranging public service announcements on school bus traffic safety laws and best driving practices.
- DEW should assess whether it’s appropriate to increase the minimum number of required training hours for school bus mechanics.
- DEW should work with the General Assembly to fund a grant program to help districts invest in bus safety features, including but not limited to seat belts. The grants should be needs-based.
- The Department of Public Safety should work with the General Assembly to strengthen penalties for drivers who violate traffic laws in school zones and around buses.
- The Department of Transportation should support cities and other local governments to assess safety conditions on local roads in and around school zones.
- Districts should audit safety of their bus routes, stops and school pick-up/drop-off sites.
- Districts should work with drivers on critical incident response planning and include them in realistic, scenarios-based critical incident exercises.
- The Highway Patrol should regularly hold school bus stakeholder meetings to identify and mitigates in critical incident responses to bus crashes and other bus safety issues.
- DEW should expand its post-crash report to collect additional information and publish data annually to inform future policy decisions.
- Districts should adopt policies that require a thorough evaluation of contracted commercial bus services.