A plan to make children safer on school buses is being finetuned by Texas lawmakers. On Wednesday, a big change was made to Texas Senate Bill 546 that requires
A plan to make children safer on school buses is being finetuned by Texas lawmakers. On Wednesday, a big change was made to Texas Senate Bill 546 that requires seatbelts on every school bus in the state.
originally allowed poorer school districts in Texas to install 2-point lap belts on their buses. A change made Wednesday requires all school districts to have three-point lap and shoulder seatbelts. They are safer, but the expense is also higher. One year ago, 44 children and 11 teachers from Hays CISD were on their way back from a field trip to the zoo when the fun day turned tragic. A concrete pump truck veered from its lane and“Every child on every school bus should have a 3-point seatbelt, period,” said Brad Brown who lost his 16-year-old daughter in a 2006 school bus crash. “No one on that bus escaped without life-changing wounds.” Brown is one of the parents who pushed the Texas Senate Transportation Committee to change the school bus seatbelt bill and remove the option to use lap belts instead of 3-point lap and shoulder belts. “Little children, like Pre-K students, they don’t have the strength and they’re going to be thrown around like ragdolls. We need to make sure they’re safe,” said Texas State Senator Jose Menendez, a state senator from San Antonio who authored SB-546. Lawmakers agree 3-point seatbelts could have made a life-saving difference in last year’s Bastrop County crash. The substitute bill would give school districts a four-year compliance window. Districts would be required to submit a plan of action to the Texas Education Agency that includes a timeline for implementation. “We need to identify the school districts that need the actual help. Maybe we can put a grant program together after we know the size of the problem. If we don’t know the problem, I don’t know how we fix it,” said Menendez. Senator Menendez says he doesn’t want to create an unfunded mandate. He says the Senate Transportation Committee needs to figure out how to help the poorer school districts comply with the more expensive seatbelt requirements.
Seatbelts Children Compliance Safety School Buses 3-Point Lap Belts Texas Lawmakers Newsletter Daily Sb-546 Local
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