Students will be making the case for other students to have access to busing to Brooks Secondary School.
At the Tuesday, October 1, committee of the whole meeting, councillor CaroleAnn Leishman said she had the number of students who do not have access to school buses in the school district because of where they live. She said there are 24 Brooks students who do not have access to the bus, so they have to buy city bus passes or get a ride in order to get to school.
“You’ll recall that youth council brought forward a year ago a bus pass lottery initiative, where council donated 25 semester bus passes to a bus pass lottery that youth council ran,” said Leishman. “Several students participated in this and they received their semester passes. Several passes did not get used so then there were a bunch of names that were brought forward from the school district of students living on the far side of Cranberry Lake who didn’t have access to the school bus, asking if potentially, council could consider giving those leftover passes to them.”
Leishman said it ended up that the city was asked to approve an additional five semester bus passes to add to the ones left over for the students without passes. She said that was a great initiative that was done last year.
This year, youth council is interested in this initiative and made a recommendation that buses should be free to all students in the region, said Leishman.
She said she understands from city chief administrative officer Russell Brewer that it sounds like School District 47 does not have any funding to accommodate these extra students.
Mayor Dave Formosa recommended that the Brooks student council and Powell River Youth Council get together and make a presentation to School District 47 trustees.
Formosa said he has brought the issue up with School District 47 superintendent Jay Yule and asked, what if the student council at Brooks met with the youth council and the two of them have a joint meeting with the school board, requesting these bus tickets?
“I said to the superintendent, ‘how do you think it would go?’” said Formosa. “He said, ‘how could we not accept a meeting with these two youth groups?’”
Formosa said maybe Leishman could have that conversation with the youth group to approach the student council, have a discussion between them, and then the two of them could present to the school board.
Formosa said the board may come back with a yes, no, or an initiative to work with the city on the busing issue.
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” said Formosa. “I think it’s a good idea.”
Leishman said she would need some numbers regarding the cost of transporting the students via city bus.
“If we are going to the school district, I would need to know from the city, what are we asking for?” She added. “Are they in-kind or are we putting it on the books?”
Councillor Jim Palm said it makes sense for the youth council to approach the student council at Brooks, they collaborate and request a meeting with the school board to bring forward their ask for the students in question to get free busing.
“We know it isn’t cheap,” said Palm. “It adds up to about $700 a month over 10 months, so that’s $7,000 just for 24 students.”
Leishman asked staff for the cost of transporting a student on the city bus and chief financial officer Adam Langenmaier said it was $105 per student per semester.
Leishman said some of the youth council members are student council members so she thinks it is best to have a couple of representatives to make a presentation to the school board regarding the busing issue.
