ALBANY, N.Y. — A Democrat in the state Senate has introduced a new bill to delay New York’s electric school bus mandate by five years.
Current state law requires school districts to stop buying new diesel buses next year and transition entire fleets to electric by 2035. But as News10NBC Investigative Reporter Jennifer Lewke has been reporting, many districts have serious concerns about cost, reliability, and availability.
The state has acknowledged some of the concerns surrounding the mandate. It is allowing districts to apply for up to two, two-year waivers. The Greece Central School District, for example, has already been granted one of those waivers. Dozens of other districts have applied for waivers.
“If the majority of the districts are going to ask for that waiver then maybe we ought to start thinking about why they’re asking for waivers, who is going to get waivers and if we’re just going to give everyone a waiver, why don’t we just pause this for 5 years,” NYS Senator Chris Ryan tells News10NBC.
Senator Ryan is a Democrat from Central New York. The school districts there have the same concerns many districts have been reporting in the Rochester region. “It’s a combination of things, whether it’s the availability of the buses, the cost of the buses, the cost to electrify the buses,” Senator Ryan says.
Legislation has already been introduced and rejected to repeal the electric bus mandate but it’s been sponsored by republicans who are in the minority.
Jennifer Lewke (News10NBC): “There have been some conversations in Albany, but I think most of them, as you know, have probably been driven by your republican colleagues, you’ve introduced some new legislation…can you walk me through what you’re asking your fellow dems to consider and why”
Senator Ryan: “The legislation is pretty simple, it’s two dates. It’s moving back the effective date and the other date by 5 years. Let’s just tap the brakes, no pun intended right…let’s put a pause on this until we actually hear back from the school districts whether this is feasible and the technology begins to work for some of my districts and your districts that are more rural. The timing is as such that now we have school districts that are going to be putting up budgets and within those budgets are going to be significant capital improvement projects, capital dollars for the buses, upgrades to transportation facilities, the ability to electrify the buses and it’s a lot and I have school districts here that are going to have rejected those dollars because of the tax increases associated with them so, I’m just saying let’s just put a pause on it until we can make sure this is right.”
Jennifer Lewke: “If the voters locally say no and there’s still these state mandates in place, then what?”
Senator Ryan: “Well, the answer to that question is that they could go back and get a waiver from NYSERDA but then my thing is… is that really what we want to do?”
Jennifer Lewke: “What have you heard from your fellow democrats, are they willing to consider it (a 5-year delay)?”
Senator Ryan: “There’s more than a few of my colleagues that are definitely listening and are hearing that from school districts back in their senate districts so, I’m looking forward to having a real conversation, i think everybody is willing to have it.”
Whether Senator Ryan’s bill gains steam in Albany remains to be seen.
Democrat NYS senator pushes to delay electric bus mandate over concerns about cost and reliability WHEC.com.
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