INDUSTRY CONNECTIONS
Nevada State Director Says New School-Bus Fire Safety
Law Is ‘Unnecessary’ While state lawmakers recognized the “School Bus Fire
Safety Bill” at a Las Vegas elementary school in November, Diana Hollander, state director of pupil transportation, said she would not join in the celebration. Adoption of SB 318 makes Nevada the second state to update this specific school bus standard following Maryland, which passed a nearly identical law that also goes into effect July 1, 2014. Te Nevada law requires all new school buses to have V-0
classification plastic in the engine compartment that meets the Standards for Safety UL 94 and have fire-block seating. Fire-block seat upholstery must meet the ASTM E1537 “Standard Test Method for Fire Testing of Upholstered Furniture” and the School Bus Seat Upholstery Fire Block Test adopted at the 2010 National Congress on School Transportation, per the bill. Te standards were pushed by the non-profit organization Citizens for Fire Safety, which worked with the Florida Institute of Technology and fire testing and research organizatoin GBH International. “We praise manufacturers for their self-instigated testing and
procedures and seek to make that the industry imperative.” said spokesperson Seth Jacobson. “We have consulted with some of the premier safety testing experts and are eager to help find the best means to update standards on school buses. We believe however, that safety should not be optional.” But Hollander said the new law is unnecessary because
school bus manufacturers already comply with the NCST recommendations. Also, the “fire-block” materials referenced in the bill relate to furniture used in “public occupancies,” such as prisons and hospitals, not vehicles. “School buses are the most federally regulated vehicles on
the road. Tey’re the safest vehicles as well,” said Hollander. “We won’t be following these standards in 2014. We’ll be issuing waivers to school districts.”
BIZ BITES:
Tomas Built Buses selected bus driver Joyce St. John as the 2011 Children’s Choice School Bus Driver of the Year. St. John retired at the end of the 2010–2011 school year, her 42nd driving for Morgan County Schools in Decatur, Ala. She was nominated for the sixth annual award by 10-year-old rider Mauriene Clark, who called St. John “the best bus driver in the world.” Clark also wrote that St. John paid particular attention to children with medical problems, “taught us manners” and kept the bus clean … Dr. Linda F. Bluth, past- president of the National Association for
Pupil Transportation, is endorsing the suite of training modules created by the School Bus Safety Company (SBSC) that provide interactive DVD and workbook courses on driver training, transporting students with disabilities, bullying prevention and OSHA compliance … Columbus City Schools, the largest school district in Ohio, selected the VersaTrans by Tyler Technologies as its student transportation management solution … Atlantic Express purchased 25 new propane Type A buses from Collins Bus Corporation for Los Angeles Unified
20 School Transportation News Magazine January 2012
School District … Meanwhile, Mesa (Ariz.) Unified School District became the first in the state to go propane after purchasing 27 Micro Bird alt-fuel
school buses in
November … Seon Design was named the world’s no. 1 mobile video supplier for the third-consecutive time by IMS Research, a UK-based independent market analysis firm … Zonar Systems announced ZPass+, the next generation version of its student tracking system on school buses. Te latest update gives parents a web-based portal to securely view the information.
New School Bus Safety
Tools Available NHTSA announced at the
NAPT Summit in October that it has updated its web pages dedicated to school bus safety. Te new resource is geared
toward student transportation professionals
as well as the
public and features training materials for bus drivers. It also offer the latest news in school
transportation and industry regulations. At the NASDPTS meeting held concurrently in Cincinnati,
Leah Walton, NHTSA’s school bus program administrator, announced that the updated School Bus Driver In-Service Safety Series is now available. Readers can visit the new website at
www.stnonline.com/go/856. Te training covers such topics as driver attitude and routing knowledge, loading and unloading. Additionally, NHTSA has posted a Child Safety Restraint Systems on School Buses training video on its website at
www.stnonline.com/go/857, with six modules covering child safety restraint systems. Later, NHTSA Administrator David Strickland announced
the official rollout of the “My Choice, My Ride,” a joint campaign with the American School Bus Council (ASBC) to raise public awareness about the benefits of the yellow school bus. A new website,
www.schoolbusfacts.com, lists school bus safety facts and information published by the feds that school buses account for only 2 percent of approximately 800 pupil transportation deaths that occur each year. “Te campaign is the first step in a larger, multi-faceted
campaign to fight transportation service cuts and create a grassroots community capable of protecting the yellow school bus in their district,” said Bob Riley, executive director of NASDPTS, a member of ASBC.
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