The Paso Robles school district board of trustees discussed several new transportation bus routes options to reduce spending, but ultimately tabled discussion until another meeting. Chief Business Officer Brad Pawlowski presented a cost comparison that showed the Paso Robles students pay $190 per year to ride the bus, which is $10 less than Templeton, but $10 greater than the San Luis Coastal district. Students in the Lucia Mar school district pay $280 per year.
Staff recommended option #2 proposed by Pawlowski, which would eliminate general education busing with the exception of Heritage Ranch high school students and San Miguel high school students. Those routes would utilize 3 buses and 3 permanent school bus drivers.
The district would also provide 7 Special Needs routes to serve 65-70 students in adaptive school buses. There would be three additional Special Needs van routes to serve hard of hearing special education students and several non-ambulatory students.
Option #2 would reduce the district budget by $150,000. The board of trustees elected to table the discussion until more information can be gathered.
The district is operating at a deficit, and needs to cut about two millions dollars from its budget to get the budget reserve above 3% in the next fiscal year. The state requires a minimum 3% budget reserve. That’s 3% of its annual operating budget. The district exhausted a 10% reserve during superintendent Chris Williams administration.