State Officials to Check School Bus Permits for Unsafe, Criminal Drivers

Prodded by a San Fernando Valley lawmaker, state officials pledged Tuesday to immediately begin checking temporary school bus driver permits for those with criminal and unsafe driving records.

On Monday, Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) disclosed that state officials knew more than a month ago that Harold Keith Lone--charged last week with drunk driving while trying to pick up students in Encino--obtained a temporary school bus driver’s license under an alias and had an extensive criminal record.

Katz said State Department of Justice policies prevented it from releasing information on criminal convictions in the cases of persons awaiting trial. A Department of Justice spokesman said Tuesday that the policy was required by court order.

As a result of the Lone case, a department spokesman said Tuesday, fingerprint checks will be run immediately on those now holding temporary school bus operator permits “on a priority basis, if we can identify them.”

Fred Wynbrandt, a state Department of Justice official who oversees the criminal identification and information branch, also said that “if we run into someone with a record . . . we’ll go back to the courts.”

Wynbrandt said that statewide there is a backlog of roughly 600 temporary bus driver permits that have been issued but not checked for criminal and poor driving records. In addition to school bus operators, the group includes drivers of church, farm labor and van pool buses.

If identifying the school bus permits proves unwieldy, state officials will reduce the backlog by processing the oldest of the 600 permits first, Wynbrandt said. He estimated that some were issued as long ago as 30 days.

Katz, chairman of the Assembly Transportation Committee, said Monday he asked that changes be made that would allow the California Highway Patrol and Department of Motor Vehicles to complete background checks and issue permanent bus driver’s licenses rapidly enough that temporary licenses would not be needed.

Wynbrandt said those changes are being made. Tuesday’s action promised an immediate check of the backlog of temporary permits already issued.