Texas Joins States Requiring School Bus Seat Belts
While the issue has been debated for years, more and more states are conceding that school bus safety is not fool proof, and it may be better to have students safely strapped in. Texas has just joined the ranks of states passing new laws requiring that students are buckled up.
The Texas Senate approved a law requiring seat belts on all Texas school buses. Starting September 1, 2010, each bus purchased by Texas school systems will have to be equipped with seat belts.
The bill was passed largely because of a tragic accident on March 29, 2006, when a school bus carrying the West Brook High School soccer team flipped over killing two teenage girls. Dubbed “Ashley and Alicia’s Bill,” the new law will require three-point seat belts on every school bus.
Because of the high center of gravity, school buses are more prone to rolling over than other cars and even SUVs. The federal government has been trying to reduce these rollovers by passing U.S. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard #220 in 1977. Technology has advanced a long way in the last 30 years and electronic stability controls now make it even harder for school buses to tip over – but they still do.
The bill will not require that school districts begin replacing their old buses with the safer ones. Texas officials report that it will cost the state about $580 million in the 2011-2012 school years alone to begin to replace the buses.
The National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services estimates that school buses transport 24 million students a year for a total of 4 billion miles traveled. About five children are killed in school bus accidents on average every year.
Texas joins five other states (New York, New Jersey, Louisiana, California, and Florida) in proposing a school bus seat belt law. The law is now being turned over to the House of Representatives for consideration. It is expected that the Texas Educational Association will draft regulations that will require students to wear the safety belts and impose disciplinary actions for those students who do not.
New federal guidelines due this fall are expected to propose voluntary standards for the use of belts. Though school bus accidents resulting in death are rare, it impacts the entire community.
Researchers at Columbus Children’s Hospital in Ohio last year found 17,000 school bus-related injuries in the U.S. every year, a rate up to three times more than expected.
Experts express concern about the amount of force transferred by a side impact or rollover to the bodies of school children. Videos have been released showing how children may be flung from one side of the bus to the other.
Others have long debated that high-back, school bus seat compartments serve to keep students safe – except in rollover crashes. Most school districts across the country don’t require seat belts on school buses, largely because of cost and low fatality rates that suggest the big yellow bus already is safe.
In the past, transportation officials have rejected mandating seat belts. The government has favored installing energy-absorbent, high-back seats with narrow spacing between each seat. But all of these safety devices might make the buses too expensive.
Consumer advocates claim lap-and-shoulder belts would add only about $3,000 to the $70,000 cost of a typical new 72-seater school bus. However, some bus makers say the devices could add $10,000 or more per bus. Life expectancy of school buses is 10 to 15 years, so many districts buy new ones almost every year.
Districts, especially those struggling to make ends meet, worry that seat belts would limit capacity to two students per seat, forcing them to buy a third more buses.
— Teachers of Color
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