Countywide : Dial-a-Ride Trips to School Out as Bill Dies
A bill that would have allowed the Orange County Transit District and other public transit agencies to transport schoolchildren in dial-a-ride vans failed to survive a vote Tuesday in the state Senate Transportation Committee.
Although the panel voted 4 to 3 in favor of the legislation offered by Assemblyman Gary A. Condit (D-Ceres), six votes were needed to send the bill to the Senate floor.
Anaheim Republican John Seymour was one of three senators who voted to kill the bill. The vote came after OCTD lawyer Kennard R. Smart Jr. testified that it would cost the agency too much to retrofit vans to meet state school bus safety standards and have drivers trained as school bus operators.
OCTD officials said last week that they were carrying about 1,300 to 1,700 students a day in dial-a-ride vans, even though the California Highway Patrol ordered a halt to such student transportation in December, 1983.
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