VIDEO: Students Get A “Cool” Ride To School

PICKENS CO., AL. (WCBI) — School is back in session in Pickens County, Alabama but students, teachers, and bus drivers never get a break from the heat.

for this upcoming school year, however, students can keep it cool to and from the schoolhouse.

The Pickens County school board approved the purchases of eleven new buses, nine 72-person capacity units and two special needs units, complete with air conditioning for the 2016 school year.

Residents can be thanked for the “cool” additions. The board was able to make the bus purchase thanks to money that was collected from a sale tax increase voted on by residents two years ago.

“Part of our plan was to purchase some new buses because it had been since 2009 since we bought new buses to add to the fleet”, said Superintendent Jamie Chapman.

“This is their tax dollars at work on this first day of 2016.”

Transportation Director Turner Oliver says the new school cruisers will help accomdate every student in the county because “…we have students with different allergies or have seizures…and this makes their life a little easier.”

The buses are a more than one million dollar investment, with a special needs unit costing around $94,000 dollars and a large capacity unit costing around $84,000 dollars.  Chapman said its also an additional three to four thousand dollars to install air conditioning.

Chapman said the state of Alabama provides the buses through a fleet renewal deal that allows the purchases to be paid off over a ten-year time-span.

“I ask everybody in our system to treat kids in our system the way you’d want your own kids treated”, said Chapman, “…we’re making things better for them, they don’t play second fiddle to anybody from transportation, to academics, to technology, to sports programs.”

Chapman also said his goals for the future are to have air conditioning in every single bus unit in the fleet.