BILLS WOULD IMPROVE SCHOOL BUS SAFETY
(AUSTIN) — The Senate Transportation Committee on Wednesday took up a pair of bills looking to keep kids safer on their daily trips on the school bus. The first bill, SB 744, by New Braunfels Senator Donna Campbell, would permit school districts to install cameras on school buses to catch people who disregard the stop arm and flashing lights. Campbell said this equipment was beginning to be adopted across the state, until the program got caught up in the red light camera ban passed by the legislature in 2019. Federal statistics show, she said, that there are more than 45 million illegal passes every year, each one of which risks the life of children. “Illegal passing of stopped school buses are a significant threat to student safety,” she said. In 2023, 11 Texas school students were struck and killed by drivers ignoring a stopped bus, said Campbell.
Among those testifying in support was José Javier Vazquez, who has driven buses for Laredo’s United ISD for 31 years. He said that his district installed cameras on some buses as part of a pilot program and buses recorded 2,100 illegal passes in just five months. “It is nearly impossible to hold these drivers accountable, unless a police officer sees it happen or I somehow get a license plate number while also managing a bus full of kids,” said Vazquez. The bill would allow school districts to partner with local law enforcement to issue citations, or they could take it on themselves.
The second bill, by San Antonio Senator José Menéndez, aims to put a three-point seatbelt in every seat in every school bus in the state. First, he said, the state needs to figure out how big the problem is and who needs help. This requirement was originally passed by the legislature in 2007, but in 2017 a new law permitted districts to waive the requirement – after a public vote – if the costs to the district would be too onerous. What happened is an unequal distribution of belts between richer and poorer districts. Some districts have three-point harnesses on every bus. Many don’t. “One of my districts, less than half of their buses have three-point seat belts,” said Menéndez. “
Originally the plan was to let poorer districts install cheaper, two-point restraints, but Menéndez said that those belts just aren’t good enough. “If you can’t afford the three-point initially, we were saying, you could use a two-point” he said. “We were visiting with a lot of families, they said ‘Look, that doesn’t really make them safer, especially for little bodies.’” Instead, SB 546 would require districts to put together a plan on how to install belts on all their buses within four years and then submit that to TEA and the legislature. That, said Menéndez, will give lawmakers something to work with. “We need to identify the districts that need the additional help, maybe we can put a grant program together after we know the size of the problem,” he said.
On the floor Wednesday, the Senate approved a bill aimed at easing the regulatory burden in Texas. Weatherford Senator Phil King says that the state of Texas ranks fifth in total number of rules and regulations. His bill, SB 14, would create a new, regulatory efficiency office within the Office of the Governor, charged with looking over these regulations and recommending changes or removal. It would also create a user-friendly web portal that business owners could use to look up applicable state rules. Finally, it would recognize the US Supreme Court’s rejection of administrative deference, commonly known as “Chevron deference”, directing that state courts not give deference to state agency interpretations of rules in court challenges. This bill is one of Lt. Governor Dan Patrick’s priority bills. “The Texas economy is the envy of America and the world. Texans understand that by cutting red tape, more money stays in the pocket of taxpayers,” he said in a statement following passage. “When Texans save money, the private sector is unleashed, Texans start small businesses, jobs are created, and our economy grows”.
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