Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District will add 10 new buses to its fleet and potentially more bus routes to start the 2019-20 school year.
SOCSD board members unanimously approved a resolution Tuesday night allowing the school district to borrow $500,000 in a “16th Section” loan for half of the district’s bus purchase.
Board members approved the purchase of 10 total buses, five of which will be funded through the 16th Section loan and five of which will be included in the Fiscal Year 2019-20 operating expenses.
David Baggett, assistant superintendent of personnel and operations, told board members the purchase of 10 new buses was much needed. That will bring the district’s total fleet to 76 buses.
“We have to use our activity buses during routes we normally wouldn’t use,” Baggett said. “Because we have too many buses broken down or on a field trip. This is much, much needed.”
SOCSD Chief Financial Officer Tammie McGarr said the district has $1.5 million currently in its 16th Section fund. That comes from revenue from district-owned property across the county that is leased to private citizens for uses such as hunting, fishing, residential and commercial. The district can also harvest timber at some of those properties. The state designates what land qualifies as 16th Section.
Baggett told The Dispatch after the meeting the 16th Section loan allows the district to essentially borrow money from themselves, rather than from a bank.
“We’ve got a pot of money we make from our 16th Section land,” Baggett said. “We are allowed to borrow from that fund, in this case to buy buses, and we just pay back the interest to ourselves. We are borrowing the money from ourselves and we are going to pay it back.”
Baggett added, this purchase will be on a three-year rotation. This year, the district will purchase 10 new buses. For the next two years, SOCSD will purchase five and then 10 more the following year.
“This is a long-range plan,” Baggett said. “We’ve been talking about this for three years. We feel like this is gong to take care of us moving forward.”
Kelvin Gibson, SOCSD director of transportation, said of the district’s 66 current buses, 15 are older and have a “high maintenance costs.”
Adding 10 buses, Gibson said is going to allow the district to use the older buses for in-town field trips or use parts to repair the newer buses.
Gibson added the district has struggled with bus repairs lately and with the new additions, those problems can be alleviated. At one point in 2018-19, he said, SOCSD had 10 buses that were not in operation and bus drivers shared buses. Drivers had to wait for a route to finish before they could pick up students, causing some students to be late for school. In addition, Gibson said he hopes to increase the bus routes in the county.
“It’s going to allow us to take some of those long routes that are about an hour-and-a-half to an hour and 45 minutes. … I’ll be able to add a bus to that route which will shorten the time of the bus routes and allow those kids to get to school in the morning and a decent time and not rush to eat breakfast,” Gibson said. “Just have a real calm start to their day, instead of a real stressful morning which creates a lot of anxiety.”
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