WINCHESTER, Ky. — A bill introduced in the Kentucky State Senate aims to improve safety with school buses.
Senate Bill 38 creates a civil penalty for violating the stop arm of a school bus when students are getting on or off the bus. State Senator Greg Elkins, R-Winchester, said the legislation has been filed before in the Kentucky House.
“It’s designed to help protect student safety and to reduce the sometimes dangerous driving behaviors around and near our school buses,” Elkins said.
Elkins says ignoring a stop arm is already illegal, but his bill allows districts to fine drivers caught on camera speeding past a stopped bus.
“The civil penalty would go to our school systems where the school system can use it to pay the equipment necessary to help track these violations as they take place,” Elkins said.
While stop arm cameras aren’t new technology, Senate Bill 38 would allow districts who use a camera monitoring system on their buses to collect any revenue from a stop arm violation civil citation. The first offense being $300 and every subsequent offense, $500.
Daren Snell, director of logistics at Clark County Public Schools said drivers running a stop arm is a regular occurrence.
“We’ve got some older buses that were fitted with stop arm cameras. They’re a little outdated right now. We’ve tried to get some video and some license plates, but we’ve not been able to get very many,” Snell said.
In Clark County, most buses aren’t running stop arm cameras. Snell said if passed, the bill would help them upgrade technology and offset costs. Every bus in Clark County has interior cameras, according to Snell.
“I’ve not priced stop arm cameras, but if they’re like any other camera, we put on a bus, they’re going to be $300 a piece and you’ll need two on each bus, one forward facing and one rear facing to be able to get license plates,” Snell said.
Cameras would automatically record once the stop arm is engaged. But the bill does not make the use of the cameras mandatory.
“You can store those recordings for 31 days, so at the end of a 31-day period those recordings might be destroyed unless there’s a penalty involved, then that recording has to be destroyed upon the disposition of the penalty,” Elkins said.
SB 38 also clarifies when drivers are required to stop for school buses. Elkins said his bill also hopes to address ways to challenge a possible violation.
The bill has been assigned to the Senate’s transportation committee.