Some Parents Are Angry Over Bus Fees : Schools: Conejo Valley Unified officials say the $450 yearly charge per student can save the district about $400,000.

The Conejo Valley Unified School District’s decision to charge $450 annually for each student who rides a school bus left some parents fuming on Friday.

Officials in the financially strapped district said the decision, made Thursday night, came after several months of public meetings at which the bus fee was proposed as one way to funnel more money into the classroom.

Nevertheless, some parents interviewed on Friday outside two schools insisted that it’s wrong to end the free school bus service.

“It’s bogus!” said Pamela Sunder, who has two children attending Conejo Elementary School. “If they want to take money, let them take it from the administrators.”

Another Conejo Elementary parent, Jean Chipongian, said her son, Karl, sometimes rides the bus to school but will not do so if the family is charged. “We’re trying to save for a house,” she said. “I’d find a way for him to walk or ride his bike.”

At Manzanita School in Newbury Park, Parent Faculty Assn. President Linda Mullen said parents of about 130 children who are bused from a low-income housing complex across the busy Ventura Freeway will not be able to afford the fee.

Mullen said she was dismayed by the school board’s decision.

“I don’t think there’s a parent who’s involved in the school who doesn’t understand budget restrictions,” she said. “The problem is, the people who are just eking it out--it’s going to mean their kids walking (on an overpass) across the freeway.”

District officials, however, said low-income families whose children qualify for free lunches under state guidelines will be eligible for a free bus pass.

Another Manzanita parent, Patty Fry of Newbury Park, said she agrees with the district that funding for the classroom is a higher priority than busing. “Transportation is something I can provide for my child,” she said.

The busing fee, scheduled to begin in the 1992-93 school year, was prompted by a projected $2.8-million deficit in next year’s budget. Administrators say they can save an estimated $400,000 by charging for transportation.

The district now spends about $300 per student during the school year to bus more than 1,400 of its 17,500 students, district officials said. But, they say, the district has set the new charge at $450 because there has been a 16% increase in its transportation contract. The district also anticipates that because of the new fee, fewer students will ride school buses--thereby raising the cost per student.

District officials said only one parent spoke against the fee at Thursday night’s meeting. They said few complained by phone on Friday.

“I think people are resigned to it,” said William H. Henry Jr., president of the Board of Education. “We feel it was better to put our money into teachers than into yellow buses.”

During a meeting with Thousand Oaks officials on Monday, Henry plans to discuss how the busing fee might affect crossing guard services and traffic patterns, as more children walk to school or get a ride from a parent.

Conejo Valley is the only school district in Ventura County that has imposed such fees since the state Supreme Court last month upheld charges for bus services.

Simi Valley Unified School District board members discussed busing fees earlier this month but dropped the issue until next fall. Deputy Supt. Mary Beth Wolford said she has been asked to determine whether busing fees lead to a drop in student attendance in the districts where they are charged.

Simi Valley Unified board members “feel that charging a (busing) fee to parents is something we would try not to do because we want to make it as easy as possible for students to get to school,” Wolford said.

The fee adopted for Conejo Valley Unified is one of the highest approved by a school board in Southern California. Two weeks ago, the Saddleback Valley Unified School District in Mission Viejo tentatively endorsed a plan to raise the annual cost of bus passes from $150 to $365.

The public bus charge is also lower than the Conejo Valley Unified fee. Thousand Oaks Transit charges $26 for 40 rides for students, or about 65 cents a ride. The city bus system travels by eight high schools and junior high schools.

In 1991, about 17.6% of the 110,284 Thousand Oaks Transit rides taken last year were taken by students going to school, said Barbara Dalrymple, a clerk for the transit system.