Bill Text: WV HB2740 | 2025 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: To establish requirements for adult supervision on county school buses
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 10-0)
Status: (Introduced) 2025-02-21 - To House Education [HB2740 Detail]
Download: West_Virginia-2025-HB2740-Introduced.html
WEST VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE
2025 REGULAR SESSION
Introduced
House Bill 2740
By Delegates Pritt, Clay, Moore, T. Clark, Stephens, Chiarelli, Coop-Gonzalez, Crouse, Drennan, and Maynor
[Introduced February 21, 2025; referred to the Committee on Education then Finance]
A BILL to amend and reenact §18-2E-5d of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, relating to requiring the presence of a second adult on a school bus when elementary children are mixed with middle school aged children on a route.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
ARTICLE 2E. HIGH QUALITY EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS.
§18-2E-5d. Standards for the duration of school bus transportation times for students to and from school; additional safety requirement for certain routes.
(a) The high quality standards for transportation adopted by the state board pursuant to section five of this article shall include standards for the recommended duration of the one-way school bus transportation time for students to and from school under normal weather and operating conditions as follows:
(1) For elementary school students, thirty minutes;
(2) For middle school, intermediate school and junior high school students, forty-five minutes; and
(3) For high school students, sixty minutes.
(b) A county board may not create a new bus route for the transportation of students in any of the grade levels prekindergarten through grade five to and from any school included in a school closure, consolidation or new construction project approved after July 1, 2008, which exceeds by more than fifteen minutes the recommended duration of the one-way school bus transportation time for elementary students adopted by the state board in accordance with subsection (a) of this section unless:
(1) The county board adopts a separate motion to approve creation of the route and request written permission of the state board to create the route; and
(2) Receives the written permission of the state board to create the route.
(c) A county board may not create, nor may the state board permit, the creation of a new bus route for the transportation of students in any of the grade levels prekindergarten through grade five to and from any school included in a school closure, consolidation or new construction project approved after July 1, 2008, which exceeds by more than thirty minutes the recommended duration of the one-way school bus transportation time for elementary students adopted by the state board in accordance with subsection (a) of this section.
(d) The state board shall provide technical assistance to county boards with the objective of achieving school bus transportation routes for students which are within the recommended time durations established by the state board.
(e) If a school system is running bus routes where elementary or pre-kindergarten aged children, defined as pre-k through 4th grade, are present, and those students are mixed with middle school-aged children or above, then a second adult shall be present on the bus to maintain order and safety.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to require the presence of a second adult on a school bus when elementary children are mixed with middle school aged or high school aged children on a route.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from a heading or the present law and underscoring indicates new language that would be added.
