SAN ANTONIO — Five buses from Hays County arrived at the Boerne ISD bus depot Friday. They weren't carrying kids, yet, but they will help keep the district's young students safe this summer.
"Today was a great day for Boerne ISD and a great partnership with Hays CISD. We called them up and said, 'We need five buses for air-conditioned routes,' and Hays worked with our administration and delivered the buses today," Communications Director Bryan Benway said.
Boerne ISD needed 48 buses to cover routes to their 12 campuses this school year, but only 43 had working air conditioning. The five buses loaned by Hays CISD will now allow all kids and bus drivers to stay cooler as the summer stretches on into the fall semester.
Benway said the school district borrowed five other buses last week from an "anonymous donor" but had to give them back.
Bus driver Paul Everett told KENS 5 the new vehicles mark a welcome change.
"This year is way better with these AC buses. With the heat, the kids get a little more restless, sometimes a little more silent and you are always looking in the mirror trying to check on them," Everett said. "An AC bus to a bus driver is like... gold. We sit in those buses every day, six hours a day, and we are just sweltering the whole time."
Driver Paul Caldwell also told KENS 5 this would make things better for local kids.
"The heat is pretty unbearable in the afternoon. It can get very uncomfortable for both me as a driver and for students," Caldwell said. "It's great that the district is doing what they can to cool it down for us."
Unfortunately, bigger school districts will still have some older, non-air-conditioned buses on the road. The much larger Northside ISD has 131 campuses and a fleet of around 900 buses to get the job done.
Communications Director Berry Perez said around 45% of their buses have air conditioning, but with more than 101,000 students the school district will still need some of those older buses on the road. NISD is now changing routes to be more strategic with the buses that do have air conditioning equipped.
"We look for any particular route that might be longer or any route that might be a special needs route. Those types of routes will be prioritized so that we can provide air conditioned buses to those routes first," Perez said.
Perez said the school district is getting another 65 new school buses this year, all of which are expected to have air conditioning in the future. At the same time, those new buses can cost $160,000 each, so replacing a whole fleet will take years.
In the meantime, Perez said parents can learn more about planned bus routes here. He told KENS 5 parents and bus drivers will need to be vigilant to keep kids safe as the heat continues.
"Make sure when they get on the buses, if they drivers haven't already done so, make sure those windows are lowered," he said. "Make sure that their is circulation on the bus. Make sure that (students) are hydrating and make sure that water as well."
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