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The principal of a Big Island public charter school says he’s been left scrambling after receiving last-minute notice from the Hawaii Department of Education that his school would no longer be eligible for basic student bus services.

The parents of some of the school’s students can surely relate. They are organizing carpools and footing the bill for gas, even though they are poor enough for their children to qualify for free meals at school. Kids are left to walk along roads that can be dangerous in areas without sidewalks or shoulder lanes and to cross highways between speeding cars to catch infrequent public buses. One child was even spotted trying to hitchhike.

Principal Steve Hirakami says it wasn’t until Aug. 2 — three days before the start of the school year — when he was told that roughly 50 general education students at Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science wouldn’t have rides to school.

A restricts charter school students from DOE-provided school bus services, so most charter schools figure out their own transportation. But Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science, which sits in a remote, impoverished part of the island and serves about 580 students, was an exception because it had for years transported its students on buses contracted with the nearby Pahoa High and Intermediate School.

The informal arrangement, according to Hirakami, made perfect sense: it generated revenue for the DOE, which earned twice as much per Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science charter school student as it did per public school pupil. That deal also put bodies in seats that would otherwise remain empty.

“At the end of the day I worked out that deal because it’s the safest way to get kids to and from school,” Hirakami said. “All of a sudden the plug was pulled.”

DOE Spokeswoman Donalyn Dela Cruz said the department decided to more strictly enforce school board policies, including those that bar charter school students from bus services, as part of larger efforts to completely revamp the state’s beleaguered student transportation system.

But the problem was avoidable, according to Hirakami, who said the department should have communicated better about the changes.

Other officials said it’s time to revise complex policies that govern what DOE services charter schools are and are not eligible for. The academy’s arrangement with Pahoa High and Intermediate School was based on a handshake agreement that the DOE had approved despite the state policy. Its decision to enforce the rule this year is what caught Hirakami by surprise.

“It was the informality of the agreement that led to the confusion,” said Charter School Commission Executive Director Tom Hutton.

The Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science busing debacle traces back to April, when Hirakami got word that the school’s special education students wouldn’t be eligible for curb-to-curb bus services.

He panicked. Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science was the only charter school in the state to rely on those special-needs services, and some of the school’s students live as far as Hilo, which is about 20 miles away. He immediately consulted with Hutton, who eventually worked out a solution with district officials for the school’s special education students. (Five special education students are getting curb-to-curb services this year.)

But Hirakami and Hutton say that they didn’t know that the DOE would be discontinuing school bus services for the school’s general education students. That was the news they got on Aug. 2.

“It really wasn’t on our radar that the general education deal that the school had worked out was being reconsidered,” Hutton said.

But the news shouldn’t have been a surprise, Dela Cruz said, citing a June 14 memo reminding all school administrators and the Charter School Administrative Office, among others, of the policy that bars charter students from school bus services. She said department officials decided to end the exception for Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science as part of a broader effort to better manage its student transportation branch, treat all charter schools equally and keep a “clean book going forward.”

Charter schools, she pointed out, can choose to use a portion of their legislative funding for bus services.

Still, Hirakami questioned why the department didn’t make a more concerted effort to ensure he was prepared for the change. He said he never received the June 14 memo, nor did he ever get a phone call from the department.

Hirakami held an impromptu press conference Aug. 4 to notify parents and the public about the dilemma and to come up with temporary solutions for the students who depend on the school buses. Big Island Video News of the meeting shows roughly 70 parents and community members, many of them visibly outraged; several railed against the DOE for treating charter school students like second-class citizens.

For now, Hirakami said that carpooling raises serious liability issues for drivers, in addition to putting a burden on struggling parents who are sacrificing their time and money to get kids to school. More than three-fourths — 82 percent — of the academy’s students receive free or reduced-price meals.

Winston Albright, whose 6-year-old son attends Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science, warned of an array of dangers for students left without school busing in a geographic district the size of Oahu. His wife even saw one of her son’s schoolmates, a high schooler, trying to hitchhike to the academy.

The situation, Albright said, is especially frustrating when Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science students see non-charter school children around them get on half-empty buses headed to a school right next to their own.

The bus cuts are just another example of the state’s habit of shortchanging charter schools, he said.

Dela Cruz and other officials said the department is actively working on a solution for Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science.

“We do understand it’s rural,” she said. “This does not mean that we want students left on the sidewalk not being able to get to school.”

Board of Education Vice Chairman Brian DeLima, who represents the Big Island, understands why the DOE wants to be consistent in its policies, but said that it should modify them if, and when, it makes sense.

“We don’t want to have a foolish consistency,” he said. “We want to make sure we apply common sense to what appears to be a problem.”