New Proposal Would Require Seatbelts On School Buses In Texas

One of the things that has always been hotly discussed in Texas is putting seatbelts in school buses. Over the last year, we've heard of several accidents that have happened including school busses in the state.

Most recently, there was one right here in Amarillo where a bus got hit by a semi-truck. Thankfully, no one was severely hurt in that accident, but it did re-raise the concerns.

Last March, however, there was a deadly accident in Bastrop County involving a bus and a concrete truck. Two people were ultimately killed in that accident, one of them a 5-year-old child, and another being a driver who was following behind in the bus.

Seatbelts on buses have begun to show up as a law was passed a while back requiring all new busses to have seatbelts on them. However, that only applies to buses that were purchased after 2017 when the law passed.

What it did NOT have was a provision that stated all older buses that were in operation had seatbelts installed.

That's all about to change...potentially.

A proposal has been put in front of lawmakers to require that all school buses have seatbelts in them in order to be functional and used. The problem hasn't ever been that school districts don't want to make the buses safer.

It's money. School districts, especially smaller ones already face financial strains for the things they need in order to educate the children that adding seatbelts to their existing line of busses could push them into a bad financial area.

One issue with the proposal right out of the gate though is that it won't provide these districts additional funding. Without funding from the state, school districts may not be able to comply with the ruling should it pass.

It's the ultimate Catch-22. Now, the bill does state districts would be able to accept gifts, donations, and grants in order to push through and get the seatbelts done, but there's no guarantee they'll be able to achieve the funding they need.

Stay tuned, this could get interesting.