LOWER LAKE — The Konocti Unified School District Board of Trustees gave consensus for staff to continue working on changes to the transportation department for the 2011-12 school year Wednesday night at its first meeting of the month.
Dana Moore, director of maintenance and operations, presented a plan to the board that would integrate the transportation department with all the school sites in the district as well as reduce the number of bus stops by creating “super stops.”
The plan would see a certain number of buses be assigned to each district school site, establishing a relationship between students, bus drivers and school officials. Moore said this would improve communications with the schools as the bus drivers go out to pick up or drop off children. He said it would also improve handling discipline issues that occur on the buses by handling them at the school site.
Moore said the focus of the plan is to pick up students no earlier than 7 a.m., keep the students on the bus for no longer than one hour and lengthen out bus stops. Some bus stops would be changed and combined into “super stops” where many students would be picked up at one time. The plan also would eliminate stops that are very close to schools.
Moore said someone at the school sites would need to be able to communicate with the buses and with parents if any issues arise during transit in the morning and afternoon. Board members are concerned with late afternoon bus routes because the schools and district office usually don”t have many staff on-duty after 4 p.m.
The board wanted a solution to communicating with parents if issues arise with the buses during transit. A few board members suggested setting up a hotline parents could call to get updates on any bus issues.
