School Committee Looking at Ways to Preserve Watertown School Buses and Cut Costs

A School Committee proposal to limit the number of children who can ride the school bus did not sit well with some parents who said they would be left in the lurch.

Options for how to handle busing for the Watertown Public Schools was among the items discussed by the School Committee’s Budget and Finance Subcommittee meeting, Thursday night.

Currently, the Watertown Schools offers busing to students living 0.75 miles from school, and at the elementary level, anyone more than 1.5 miles or more can ride for free.

The state, however, only requires districts to bus students who live more than 2 miles from campus, said Director of Business Services Allie Altman.

The district has three school buses, which takes 313 students to Hosmer Elementary School and Watertown Middle School and costed the district $150,000 this year. A $270 bus fee paid by some riders cut $40,000 from that expense, Altman said.

By limiting busing to only students who live 2 miles away from school, the district would save $75,000, Altman said, because only one bus would be needed because only 21 students would qualify to ride, all from the middle school.

Worried Parents

Parents of Hosmer students who live on the other side of the Charles River, or even just north of it, told School Committee members that the loss of the school bus would be a major problem.

Hosmer parent April Case said, if the bus option is eliminated, her children would have to cross North Beacon and Arsenal Street to get to school from their home on Charles River Road. Losing the bus would be difficult on her family because she and her husband, Michael, work, so they would not be able to pick up their child after school.

The bus is also key for students who take part in the afterschool courses at Hosmer, or go to the Boys and Girls Club, on Whites Avenue.

“For hard-working parents, their afterschool care is the Boys and Girls Club,” Michael Case said. “They can’t walk there from Hosmer.”

Case said she would be willing to pay more to keep the bus. To cover the whole cost of busing, the fee would have to double from $270 a year to $540 a year, Altman said.

Other Options

School officials are looking for ways to continue offering busing to those who ride the bus now, without breaking families’ banks.

One alternative Altman and her staff looked at is increasing the minimum distance to qualify to ride the bus from 0.75 miles to 1 mile. That would save $40,000, Altman said.

School Committee Vice Chairman John Portz suggested making the limit for free ridership 2 miles, rather than 1.5 miles. That way the same students could ride the bus, but more families would pay the fee so the district would save money.

Altman said she and others in her office would have to calculate the savings for that scenario.

School Committee Chairman Anthony Paolillo said he would like to see both options considered.

“It might be a combination of what John said and the scenario [Altman’s office] brought up,” Paolillo said.