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School bus cuts create chaos

When the big yellow school bus pulled up to the corner of Broadway and Britton Avenue in Elmhurst at 7:50 a.m. on Tuesday, January 30, more than 100 kids were waiting in the frigid 20-degree weather. Most of the kids were headed to I.S. 5 in Elmhurst, and all were supposed to be at school by 8 a.m.
According to local parents, those who were confused about the school bus changes were told to go to that corner.
The result was chaos. As all of the youngsters tried to push their way on the bus with seats for only 44, one dad tried to push to the front to ask what would happen should his son not get on the bus.
“Kids can not wait here for hours in this weather,” said the flustered dad, Adbus Khan.
Khan said that his son had stayed home from school the day before with a bad cold, so he wanted to make sure that the shivering boy would get a seat.
But a few minutes later Khan and his 11-year-old son, Hasan, were left waiting with about 50 other kids for the bus to drive to I.S. 5 and come back to the stop for a second run. By 8:02 a.m., about 20 kids and parents had disappeared - some hopping into livery cabs that pulled up alongside the huddled mass of children, others sneaking off to makeshift carpools.
Parents complained that students who arrive late to school are given one of two late passes - a blue one for a regular tardy or a pink “bus” late slip.
Khan worried that if confusion continued in the afternoon that his son would have to find his own way home because Khan’s wife does not drive.
“Hopefully, there will be somebody there to direct the kids to the right bus,” Khan said.
Hundreds of parents citywide have also complained that because they live more than one-quarter of a mile away, their children have been booted from school bus service and instead handed MetroCards.
The Department of Education (DOE) said in a statement that it is ironing out “difficulties,” and Margie Feinberg, a spokesperson for the DOE, said that an additional bus would be sent out in the morning to bring students from the Broadway and Britton pickup to I.S. 5.
“Rather than having to continue to pay for empty seats, the DOE will redirect millions of dollars in savings to schools and to support student learning,” the statement read.
However, parents and politicians wondered if the savings came at a cost to kids.
“By not disclosing and discussing its plans before implementing them, the Department of Education … has not been fair to students,” said Senator John Sabini, who has fought to cancel route changes after he learned that only 60 percent of eligible children had signed up for busing in December 2006.
Sabini has questioned why the DOE would implement these changes - which will save the city $12 million annually - in the dead of winter.
One Elmhurst parent, Kim Seow, whose 7-year-old daughter Mary Xi takes the bus four miles to P.S. 91 in Glendale every morning, complained that the confusion was compounded because the changes went into effect citywide.
“They [school officials] should try it out first,” he said, as he waited with the bundled-up girl at 7 a.m.
“Yesterday we waited and no bus,” Seow said on Tuesday, explaining how another parent drove a carpool of five kids to school at 9 a.m. Seow said that the school told him the bus had come, and that he had missed it. But he believed that there was a mix up - the bus stop was scheduled to pick up at Broadway and 82nd Street, an address that does not exist.
That afternoon, Seow’s wife waited for an hour at the bus stop for their daughter, and got a call on her cell phone at 4 p.m. to pick up the girl.
“My wife picked up my daughter at 5 p.m.,” Seow said. “From 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., that’s worse than working hours for a little girl.”