Brief (1)
HB 2862 deals with pupil transportation. The bill contains two main concepts:
Transportation of Nonresident Pupils Across School District Boundaries. The bill amends the law which, until July 1, 2002, permits a school district to transport certain nonresident pupils across school district boundaries for school attendance purposes. The provisions of the law do not apply to pupils in a school district located in all or in part of Johnson, Sedgwick, Shawnee, or Wyandotte counties.
The law allows a parent or guardian of a pupil who lives ten or more miles from an attendance center in the district in which the pupil resides and nearer to an attendance center in another school district to apply to the board of education of the district of residence for permission to have the pupil transported to school in the other district. The board of the district of residence issues an order authorizing the receiving district to transport the pupil to and from the pupil's home to the school attended.
The main purpose of the amendments in HB 2862 is to expand coverage of the law to other members of the family of a pupil covered by the law. This includes brothers or sisters of whole or half blood or by adoption, stepbrothers or stepsisters, and foster brothers or sisters.
School District Transportation Fees. The bill generally permits school districts to charge fees for transporting students who attend public schools and State Board of Education accredited nonpublic schools and who live less than 2.5 miles from the school attended. In this connection, the bill specifies that fees may not be charged to:
Fees may cover only the costs incurred and then only to the extent not reimbursed from any other source provided by law. Fee receipts would be deposited to the school district transportation fund. Contractual provisions would govern transportation fees in districts having interdistrict educational program agreements under KSA 72-8233, as amended, or interdistrict contracts for transportation under KSA 72-8307, as amended.
Effective Date. The bill becomes effective upon publication in the Kansas Register.
Background
Representative Clay Aurand appeared before the House Education Committee as a proponent of the bill. Representative Aurand distributed a copy of a letter addressed to Representative Shari Weber in which her constituent who lives in the Council Grove school district explained that two of the family's three children are being provided out-of-district transportation to White City (Rural Vista school district), but that the third child cannot be so transported because there is a K-4 school in the district of residence less than ten miles from the family's dwelling. Now, the White City school bus driver stops in the family's front yard and picks up two children. The third child is transported by a parent to the nearest school district pick-up point on the school district's boundary line, some two miles from home, where the child boards the bus to the White City school. The amendment contained in HB 2862 is intended to make it possible for the White City school bus to pick up all three children at the family's front door.
There were no other conferees.
The fiscal note was not available for the bill at the time of the House Committee on Education's action. However, the State Department of Education reported that the bill would result in no additional cost to the state.
The Senate Committee on Education amended the bill to make it become effective upon publication in the Kansas Register.
The Senate Committee of the Whole amendment added the provisions which generally permit school districts to charge fees for transporting pupils who live less than 2.5 miles from school.
1. *Supplemental notes are prepared by the Legislative Research Department and do not express legislative intent. The supplemental note and fiscal note for this bill may be accessed on the Internet at http://www.ink.org/public/legislative/bill_search.html