Budget crisis threatens to kick more San Diego children off the bus
For years, along the coast of Northern San Diego County, parents of middle school students have paid about $500 a year so that their children can ride the school bus to classes throughout the San Dieguito Union High School District.
Photo by Charles ThompsonBut the budget crisis has come a' knocking. And those buses, like so many others, may soon be going, going, gone.
District Superintendent Ken Noah met with parents and officials late yesterday to discuss the pending changes to the school bus program. According to the North County Times, state officials have told Noah that the matching funds usually provided to districts for transportation may soon be no more. So the district must either come up with the $483,000 that the state usually paid, either by doubling the fees charged to parents or by dipping deeper into existing operating funds.
It costs roughly $1 million for school transportation in San Dieguito. Busing is already slim, as only middle schoolers get to ride from home to school. Neither high schoolers nor the elementary school students that feed into San Dieguito get bus services. The district has slightly more than 12,500 total students.
Steve Ma, associate superintendent for business services, told the Times that using