SIMI VALLEY : Board Defers Action on Imposing Bus Fee

Fearing state funds for busing may diminish or disappear next year, Simi Valley school board members have decided to postpone a decision on whether to charge parents for busing their children to school.

They plan to wait until the state passes its budget this summer for the 1993-94 fiscal year.

School board members and district administrators said Thursday that they made that decision at a school board retreat Tuesday at the home of school board President Judy Barry.

They said there is no point in debating the issue because any fee set now for next fall would increase dramatically if funding for busing is dropped from the next state budget.

Assistant Supt. Mary Beth Wolford said fears of funding cutbacks stem from a recent request from the state that school districts itemize their busing costs in terms of the number of special education students who must be bused to school and all other students who qualify for busing even though the district is not required by law to bus them.

In October, the board set up a Transportation Planning Task Force to survey how other school districts are covering the costs of providing school bus service in the wake of budget cuts.

The 16-member task force, made up of citizens, district administrators and others, decided recently to recommend that the school district gain financial relief by charging parents $175 a year per child for round-trip bus service.

The district would have to charge an annual fee of about $400 a student to fully make up for the $372,000 that it now spends out of its general fund annually to bus students to school. But the task force wanted to keep the fee competitive with public busing.