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MONROE: Courtesy busing still out of Monroe’s budget

By Amy Batista, Special Writer
   MONROE — Despite a number of irate parents coming to a July Board of Education meeting, courtesy busing will not be reinstated.
   The board held a special meeting on Aug. 13 to decide if courtesy busing should be reinstated for students in afternoon sports and clubs after cutting the service at a prior meeting.
   Parents of students have, instead, been offered a supervisory center at the middle and high schools where they can wait to be picked up and supervised for a certain amount of time for those parents that need extra time, according to officials.
   The board decided to end the service, estimated to cost $80,000, because there was not enough money in the budget.
   ”The only way the 4:30 bussing could be reinstated was to remove otherwise budgeted appropriations from the 2012-13 budget and that would thus cause hardship in some other area,” Business Administrator and Board Secretary Michael Gorski said.
   There were no additional revenues or appropriations above what was originally estimated in the budget, leaving no available balance to be transferred to the 4:30 bus issue, according to Mr. Gorski.
   ”We have no slack in this budget,” said John Leary, board member. “If you want something now then you are going to have to take it from some other place. You are robbing Peter to pay Paul.”
   One possibility would be for parents to pay for the bus service next year as a “subscription,” according to officials.”It was recommended in the 2013-14 budget process that begins in October, that one of the items that be considered would be the 4:30 bus run on a subscription service,” Mr. Gorski said.
   Under the proposal, the cost of the bus run would be shared with the parents. The board would work collaboratively with parents and administrators to design a method that would work if the board votes to approve it.
   ”Hopefully, a subscription bus service would satisfy the parents needs and also the fiscal needs within the budget and assumes that it has support by the board at that time,” Mr. Gorski said.
   Resident Lisa Weinthal asked the board to provide more details on the “band-aid formula” that is in place for the supervised center.
   ”We are preparing a posting that will go out that will identify the need for folks that would be approved by the board to supervise that center, and then (a) meeting with the principal,” said Superintendent Kenneth Hamilton. “Then we will come up with a process to identify how children will be signed in so we know who’s in there and how they will be signed out.”
   Mr. Hamilton said that initially there may be as many as 300-350 students that may need this service.
   Mr. Hamilton said the board may form a committee to look at “Pay to Ride” busing, and that the board would reach out to the various schools to see who would like to participate on the committee.
   Mr. Hamilton said administration would also research and look to see what other districts are doing.
   Resident Deidre Wynne said she is concerned that eliminating courtesy busing would lead to students piling into the cars of other students.
   ”I don’t want it to come down to where the seniors in high school are getting pressured by their friends, ‘come on you can fit me in your car, just drive me home’,” Ms. Wynne said. “Then you are having (other) high schoolers driving a bunch of kids home.”
   ”Hopefully, the supervision at the supervised centers would alleviate the pressure to (accept a) drive home from someone who is not their safe choice,” Mr. Gorski said.
   After the meeting, Mr. Gorski said that the 4:30 run would cost $100,000 to reinstate, and that the district realized $35,000 in savings from switching insurance carriers for property and casualty insurance, which the board authorized to cover cost of the supervision centers both at the high school and middle school.
   The high school supervision center would be staffed by an employee until 6:15 p.m. and the middle school would be staffed by an employee until 5:15 p.m.. The cost of both supervision centers is $25,000, according to Mr. Gorski.
   ”If you reinstate the 4:30 busing, it eliminates part of the need at the middle school and it would save $10,000,” Mr. Gorski said. “So if you net all that out, with the savings from the middle school and insurance money, and the cost of the 4:30 p.m. (bus), the district net bottom line is $80,000 to provide the service.”
   Another special meeting is schedule on Aug. 25 at 7 p.m. in the Media Room at the high school.