Dripping Springs ISD designates hazardous routes, bus service still not guaranteed

DRIPPING SPRINGS — Just like other area school districts, Dripping Springs ISD approved and updated its hazardous transportation route designations on June 26.

For state funding purposes, student transportation rides must reside 2 or more miles from the campus they regularly attend unless they reside in an area that would subject them to hazardous traffic conditions if they walked to or from school.

“Under state law, school districts do not get funding for transporting students that live within a 2-mile radius of the school,” said Deputy Superintendent of Finance & Operations Elaine Cogburn. “However, if the board establishes that an area is considered a hazardous route, then funding can be secured for those routes that are within 2 miles.”

To establish funding eligibility for the transportation of hazardous-traffic-area students, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) requires the district’s school board to adopt a local policy that meets the criteria established in the TEC, 42.155(d). A copy of the policy and any subsequent changes to the policy must be submitted to the TEA School Transportation Unit to establish eligibility for service that may be provided as a result of the policy.

The policy must define the hazardous traffic conditions that are applicable to the district and exist within 2 miles of its campuses and identify the specific areas within the district that contain the hazardous traffic conditions that the board has defined (i.e. the specific hazardous traffic areas eligible for route service).

As defined by TEC 42.155(d), a hazardous condition “exists where no walkway is provided and children must walk along or cross a freeway or expressway, an underpass, an overpass or a bridge, an uncontrolled major traffic artery, an industrial or commercial area or another comparable condition.”

The modifications/additions to the hazardous routes recommendation for 2023-24 are as follows:

• Dripping Springs Elementary: Includes additional streets developed on Big Sky Ranch

• Walnut Springs Elementary: The addition of Prairie Glover Drive off of Bell Springs Road

• Rooster Springs Elementary: No change

• Sycamore Springs Elementary: No change

• Cypress Springs Elementary: No change

• Dripping Springs Middle School: The addition of Prairie Glover Drive off of Bell Springs Road

• Sycamore Springs Middle School: No change

• Dripping Springs High School: The addition of the Heritage subdivision off of Ranch Road 12, north of the high school as construction is still occurring on the Roger Hanks expansion

“This is just adding some additional streets [and] two new neighborhoods for hazardous route purposes,” Cogburn said.

The hazardous route designations do not necessarily guarantee whether or not bus service will be provided in those areas, Cogburn clarified. No Service Zones — areas in which transportation will not be provided due to bus driver vacancy — have not been announced, but it’s the district’s goal to have them finalized by the last week of July.

DSISD is currently down 23 bus drivers districtwide, according to agenda documents from a June 19 board workshop on transportation.

“We do not have enough bus drivers,” said board president Stefani Reinold. “This will be something that we will continue to deal with as more neighborhoods and schools are being built … These kinds of issues and these conversations are not going away and we may indeed have to change potentially how we are looking at this in the future. But, to clarify again, this does not guarantee bus service for many communities.”