Ledge Asks School Bus Contractors For Answers
Hawaii lawmakers held a private meeting with school bus companies last week to talk about how to rein in prices that have more than doubled in the last six years.
Civil Beat reported earlier this month that a lack of competition and at least one company’s practice of rebidding for its contracts instead of extending them contribute to the runaway prices. Some of the increased costs are being passed on to students, whose bus fares went up almost 70 percent this summer.
“The kinds of increases we’ve been seeing cannot continue,” Sen. Jill Tokuda, education chair and a member of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, told Civil Beat Monday. “After many years of highlighting the problem, I’m really hoping we’re going to start finding some solutions.”
The Legislature already threatened this year to cut the Department of Education transportation budget by $20 million if its leaders can’t get the school bus costs under control. Student transportation makes up about $71 million of the department’s $2.5 billion budget. The Legislature required the department to present a report on the situation this December, and last week’s meeting was designed, among other things, to check in with those participating in the report. Present in addition to lawmakers and bus companies were education department officials involved in student transportation.
The group did not solve the problem in one meeting, but Tokuda came out talking optimistically. Everyone seemed willing to work together on finding solutions, and they all seemed to be on the same page, she said.
“I think all the stakeholders — the bus contractors and Department of Education officials — have the same goal in mind, and that is to provide students with transportation so they can access high-quality education,” she said. “That was encouraging.”
Everyone left with homework to do, individually and collaboratively. It’s not going to be an easy fix, Tokuda said, but she hopes to see some proposed solutions in the report this December and in the ensuing discussions.
“We just really wanted to reaffirm that it was the Legislature’s desire that the DOE and stakeholders leave no stone unturned in terms of looking at various options and scenarios to help us rein in our bus costs,” she said.
