Public school transportation in Ohio curtailed as state prioritises private school students

When students in Dayton, Ohio step outside for the first day of school this week, nearly 2,000 of them will find no familiar yellow bus waiting. For Ruben Castillo, an 11th grader at Meadowdale Career Technology Center, the absence of a ride is more than an inconvenience, it is a financial strain.

“I’m going to have to use Uber, and it’s going to cost me $25-$30 a day to get to and from school,” Castillo told The Guardian. “In wintertime, when demand is higher, it’s probably going to be more.” Over a 180-day school year, the bill runs into thousands of dollars, a cost he will bear himself.

Legal mandate shifts buses away from public school students The shortage is not due to neglect or oversight. According to The Guardian, Ohio law requires public school districts to provide transportation for students attending private and charter schools. Failure to comply can result in fines amounting to millions of dollars. In districts like Dayton, where there is already a shortage of drivers and buses, the requirement has forced administrators to give priority to non-public school students while public school students are left to find alternative transport.

Safety concerns prompt end to public bus vouchers For several years, Dayton and other cities such as Cincinnati attempted to bridge the gap by issuing public transportation passes to students. But the system had its own risks. Reports emerged of students facing safety concerns on public buses, and transit authorities struggled to manage the additional demand. According to The Guardian, the tension came to a tragic point in April, when 18-year-old Alfred Hale III was shot dead at a downtown Dayton bus hub while on his way to Dunbar High School.

Following the incident, Ohio lawmakers passed legislation prohibiting Dayton Public Schools (DPS) from providing public bus vouchers to its students. The burden of daily transport has since shifted to parents, grandparents, local churches and community organisations. Families who choose to continue using public buses must now pay at least $540 a year per high school student.

“There seems to be an aggressive approach to the most vulnerable families and people in America,” said David Lawrence, superintendent of DPS, according to The Guardian. “Not only is it unfair, it’s onerous that public schools have to provide transportation to non-public school students.”

Part of a broader education policy shift The situation reflects a broader trend across Republican-led legislatures in the United States, The Guardian noted. In Ohio, lawmakers have established a $1 billion voucher fund for families to send children to private and charter schools, many operated by religious organisations. States such as Texas, Florida, Iowa and Tennessee have implemented similar measures, directing large amounts of taxpayer funding into private school voucher systems.

In cities like Cincinnati and Columbus, the impact is visible. Cincinnati has cut more than 100 yellow bus routes, leaving children as young as 13 reliant on public transport. In Columbus, the public school system is required to bus students from 162 private and charter schools, despite more than half of its own students being African American.

District leaders say law directly affects service Dayton Public Schools board member Jocelyn Rhynard put the issue plainly in her comments to The Guardian: “It’s simple – if we did not have to bus non-public school students on our transportation, we could transport every single one of our K-12 students on yellow buses.” Currently, DPS transports between 4,000 and 5,000 private and charter school students each day.

Republican state representative Phil Plummer, who supported the voucher ban for Dayton, argues that the measure was necessary for safety. “We had an 18-year-old get shot and killed. The environment for the students is not good down there. The NAACP interviewed the children, they don’t want to ride the public transportation buses, they want to ride the yellow school buses,” he told The Guardian. Plummer says he and others located 25 buses that DPS could buy, but claims the district chose not to transport its own students.

Cost and procurement challenges DPS leaders counter that meeting current demand would require about 70 buses, a purchase that could take up to two years. “It’s an 18-month cycle,” said Lawrence. “Buses are $150,000 to $190,000 each to buy, and ones with backup cameras and air conditioning are more expensive. Then drivers have to take at least 10 tests before they become fully qualified.”

The law took effect just months before the new school year, leaving families to improvise. William Johnson, a DPS educator, described the logistical challenge for his own family: “I’m a single dad raising two kids on my own. We all have to be at school at the same time. That’s a big dilemma. I’m lucky that my 80-year-old father is going to help out taking them to school. But I ask the state [politicians] – please come up with a solution. We’re going to lose a whole generation of kids if this continues.”

A community adapting to policy change From the city’s bus hubs to its classrooms, the changes have reshaped daily life for thousands of students. For Castillo and others like him, the school year begins not with a ride, but with a reminder of how policy decisions in Columbus can alter the morning routine for an entire community.

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