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Bus 'Mess' Irks Readers

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 13, 2008

A Personal Account
The Hillsborough County Public Schools Transportation Department is getting hundreds of calls a day. Either hundreds of people have wrong numbers or there are hundreds of irate parents who are irritated over school bus transportation. I think it's the latter of the two.

My brother attends a local middle school. Notification was received from the transportation department noting the location of his new bus stop. Prior to school beginning, an e-mail was received from the middle school, informing us of the assigned bus number. That bus doesn't exist. The first day of school transpired like this: My brother left the house and walked to the bus stop. The first bus that stopped was almost full. The second bus that stopped wasn't the right one either. The third bus was a handicapped bus. The kids boarded this one and three-fourths of the kids ended up standing the whole way to the middle school. His school starts at 9 a.m., but he arrived between 9:30 and 9:45.

In the afternoon confusion still reigned. My brother received the number of the bus that doesn't exist after school. When he saw no such bus, he boarded the handicapped bus that he rode in the morning. He was pulled off of that bus and had to wait for a double-run bus to take him home.

On Aug. 19 my brother was dropped off at a new bus stop. He was never told that he was to go to the same spot the next morning, so he walked to the original bus stop and saw no one there. He then walked to where he'd been dropped off the afternoon before and barely made it in time to be picked up.

This is the wonderful account that my brother's had so far with the transportation system.

ALYSSA CARSON

Tampa

Board Reflects Bus Mess

I watched a replay of the last Hillsborough County School Board. A large part of the meeting dealt with the huge failure of a modified transportation system implemented in three areas this year.

I can only encourage you to vote and get the balance of this extremely dysfunctional board shifted.

WILLIAM CROSBY

Valrico

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