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For students that live within one mile of their school buses will not pick them up.
News Channel 5’s Joel Massey spoke with a parent who thinks that policy is too dangerous for young children.
Heather Richey is upset that her young children are not allowed to take the bus to school because they live within a mile of Nachman Elementary. She’s concerned about their safety crossing busy streets if they were to walk or ride their bike.
Richey said, “It’s not even an option. I’m not going to put a 7 and a 5 year old on a bike. someone could pick them up on the way to school they could get hit by a car there’s no way ... I’ve had to enroll them in daycare and have after-school pick them up whereas I was going to have someone here keep them after school.
She’s also worried that if they walked or rode bikes to school they would have a greater chance of being abducted.
“They’re going to be in subdivisions back here somebody could watch them for days and know they ride home and follow them and pick them up.”
Superintendent Gary Jones says it’s a matter of balancing the transportation needs of the students and keeping costs down wherever possible.
Jones said, “The public expects certain things from us and we do our best to deliver on those expectations that doesn’t mean that everyone gets what they want every time they ask for it. But on balance we try to provide a safe transportation system and a high quality transportation system.”
Four years ago a budget deficit required the school board to reinstate the one mile rule. it also complies with a state law passed by the board of elementary and secondary education.
Jones said, “We’re struggling in Rapides Parish to afford to continue to provide transportation when school districts are ending their transportation programs. So we continue to have a high level of service and balance it against funds available to us, but we don’t have the luxury of going door to door and delivering to daycares like we used to.”
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Don’t the people that live within this 1 mile rule pay taxes to keep the buses going??? It’s obvious the children’s safety is not a concern of the school board. People need to write to their congressmen and representatives.