The Gist

Georgia has ordered 256 new school buses to relieve the aging fleets in public schools around the state, but most of those new buses won’t be on the road until the end of this school year.

What’s Happening

“We’ll be looking at springtime before those buses start rolling,” said Ken Johnson, pupil transportation program manager for the Georgia Department of Education. 

Johnson said that when the new buses get on the road, they will go throughout the state — “rural Georgia to downtown Atlanta” — with the greatest need likely in fast-growing metro areas where “some of our oldest buses are probably running.”

Meanwhile, school districts are facing more immediate problems: finding and retaining bus drivers for school buses already on the road, Johnson said.

School systems have consolidated routes, adjusted school day schedules and ramped up recruitment, retention and pay to address the shortage, which has helped in many areas of the state, state education spokesperson Meghan Frick told State Affairs.

Ja’Quan White, 22, works as a substitute driver for Burke County Public Schools. His workday starts around 5 a.m. and ends well after 5 p.m. 

White fills in for drivers unable to make it to work, picking up students in the morning, dropping them off in the afternoon and transporting them to field trips and sporting events. When he’s not behind the wheel of his 2012 bus, he’s in the classroom helping teachers. He makes $3,000 a month.

White said his pay has improved and the school appears to have enough drivers but, he added, “We’d still be short-staffed if it wasn’t for the teachers and coaches.”

Why It Matters

The Richmond County school system in Augusta is facing a severe bus driver shortage, with the number of needed drivers doubling to 40 from 20 due to failed drug screenings after a bus safety meeting July 22, according to Yolanda Brown, president of the Transport Workers Union of America Local 239. 

Some of the departures were the result of “lead drivers talking to [bus drivers] like they were children,” Brown added.

Brown said more competitive pay would help attract and retain bus drivers. Although pay has improved, she noted Georgia bus drivers make comparatively less money than those in neighboring states.

The shortage has led to long hours for drivers, with some covering entire schools alone, causing delays and resulting in students missing breakfast and classes, Brown said.

State Affairs was unable to reach Richmond school officials for comment.

Some 200 miles south in Valdosta, Dianne Hogan-Thrower, a single mother of three, detailed the overcrowding on the bus, with her children having to stand in the bus aisle due to the driver’s need to cover multiple routes. Her children attend the Valdosta City School District.

Hogan-Thrower’s 9-year-old son is on the bus before 7 a.m. Because she has to be at work by 8, Hogan-Thrower has resorted to using Uber a couple of times to get her two daughters to middle school by 8:30 when their bus is delayed. 

Hogan-Thrower said she has spent over $30 for her daughters’ 10-minute Uber ride to school since the academic year  began Aug. 2.

“It’s a big inconvenience,” she said. “I’m hoping things get better. If not, I guess I am going to have to rearrange some things, and I’m going to have to drop them off early. It’s a lot, especially if transportation is provided.”

Valdosta and Richmond counties may be extreme cases. Efforts to reach school officials there and in Burke County were unsuccessful.

Public schools in Catoosa County are using a staggered school day schedule to deal with its bus driver shortage. 

“Overall, most school districts are coping. They’ve had to change how they do their routing, maybe do different tiers. They don’t necessarily report that to us,” Johnson, head of the state education department’s pupil transportation, said.

Meanwhile, Johnson noted, “We’re in the final phase of a three-year project that came out of the amended fiscal year 2022 budget.”

That project has provided new buses to districts based on the age of their fleet.

“There’s been opportunities for districts to update their bus fleet. Local districts are buying a lot of new buses,” Johnson said, often with the help of local Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, or SPLOST, money.

The amended fiscal year 2022 budget called for 1,700 buses being purchased over three years, Johnson noted.

“So that was really where we saw a great uptick in bus replacements,” Johnson said.

The Chattooga County School District has 30 routes, 29 drivers and 45 buses serving 3,000 students in rural northwest Georgia. The district started the school year in late July down three drivers. It has since added two more drivers but has no wiggle room if they get sick or don’t report for work, James Baird, the district’s transportation director, told State Affairs.

Nonetheless, the district is better off than many, Baird said, having added a dozen new buses to its fleet over the past three years with the help of state money that’s paired with local funds. More gas-fueled buses are replacing the system’s diesel buses for environmental and maintenance benefits, Baird added.

“The state’s bus-buying program has been crucial in alleviating the bus shortage,” Baird said.

Similarly, nearby Floyd County School District has 140 buses serving about 9,500 students. Nearly half — 68 — of those buses have been acquired since 2018, Trevor Hubbard, the district’s transportation director, told State Affairs. Hubbard said the district has 95 drivers, one over the state-allotted number. 

“We’re in good shape with drivers. Like everybody else, we can always use a few more,” Hubbard said.

What’s Next?

A lot of the money in the 2024-25 budget was allocated for state transportation department operations, Johnson said, including maintenance, fuel and driver salaries — key elements school districts needed.

In April, state lawmakers in the House and Senate agreed to keep $205 million of the proposed $210 million increase for student transportation recommended by Gov. Brian Kemp, which more than doubled the state’s annual funding for school bus operations.

“Typically, we’re using buses that are 15 years old or so,” Johnson said. “We’re still kind of recovering from the economic downfall we had several years ago where very few buses were purchased. So we’ve still got some work doing that. But we’re much better off today than we were three years ago.”

Know the most important news affecting Georgia

Get our free weekly newsletter that covers government, policy and politics that impact your everyday life—in 5 minutes or less.

Sign Up