BUS: Unusual use explained

In his letter Sunday, Bill Hamilton questioned a decision by Coeur d’Alene Public Schools to park a couple of school buses at the construction site of our next elementary school along Prairie Avenue with banners announcing the new school will open in September 2020.

Using older buses for this was an easy way to let our patrons know where the new school will be built. Rather than have our maintenance crew build signs in the snow, we decided to use buses that are unreliable and scheduled to be phased out of service. This also allowed our hard-working maintenance staff to continue to focus on plowing and parking lot maintenance during winter weather.

The school district is following a schedule to update its bus fleet so we are able to manage our cost of replacement over time and provide reliable transportation for students. We have six new buses scheduled to arrive at the end of May.

Our fleet of school buses is parked at our transportation facility, which is a tight 2.35 acres – one of the smallest properties the district has. Bus parking is limited, and we are over capacity. We regularly look for alternative places to park a few of the older buses. This challenge is exacerbated when we have heavy snow and snow piles reduce bus parking at the transportation facility.

JEFF VOELLER

Director of Operations

Coeur d’Alene Public Schools