A pilot program for busing private school students using public school buses and drivers likely won’t happen again next school year.
The County Council’s Transportation and Education Committees on Wednesday voted against a county executive recommendation to keep funding the program.
Montgomery County Public Schools’ move to push back its high school and middle school start times by 20 minutes starting in August means MCPS buses will very likely be unavailable for the program.
This school year, MCPS provided buses and drivers for students at six private schools around the county. It cost the county $240,000, with a $43,000 contribution from the private schools involved.
But without MCPS buses, county executive staff was working on a plan to use private charter bus operators, which carried a much higher cost.
County Executive Isiah Leggett recommended spending $659,973 to continue the program and expand it to a seventh school next school year.
All six members of the Council committees agreed that was too much.
“The game has now changed,” said Councilmember Craig Rice, referring to the bell times change from MCPS.
Instead, the committees agreed to provide $159,240 in funding for a consultant to continue tweaking and studying private school busing.
The alternate proposal “continues us in the game,” Rice said.
If approved in the final FY 2016 budget, it would mean saving half-a-million dollars from Leggett’s recommendation.
The program started last fall and grew to include six schools: the Norwood School at 8821 River Road, the Melvin J. Berman Hebrew Academy and St. Jude Regional Catholic School in Rockville and the Torah School of Greater Washington, Yeshiva of Greater Washington and St. Francis International School in Silver Spring.
In a February memo asking for $240,000 to fund the pilot for this school year, Leggett said he supported the program “in order to reduce peak hour automobile trips on County roads.”
The pilot required coordination with the public school system to make sure buses and drivers weren’t needed at the same time for public school students.
Todd Watkins, director of transportation for MCPS, told the Council that with later school start times, he’s unsure if public school buses and drivers will be available at all. Watkins said the school system would need at least the month of September to evaluate how the shifting bell times affect their bus services.
