BRANSON MO NEWS: A pair of Branson school buses will be headed to an early retirement as Branson Public Schools qualifies for a school bus replacement grant.
Rob Watson, transportation director for Branson Public Schools, said the grant is made possible because of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and the Diesel Admission Reduction Act.
“They call it early school-bus replacement,” Watson said. “The idea is, take older buses which have older emissions, worse emissions from diesel, and replace them with more emission-efficient buses.”
According to Watson, the grant will cover 25 percent of replacement cost and the purchase of two buses with 2018 engines.
“It would save us $18,000 per bus,” Watson said. “So it would save us $36,000 on two new buses this year.”
There are 65 school buses currently operating in the Branson School District. Watson said the buses the district planned on replacing originally weren’t scheduled to be replaced until the year 2021.
“The ones we’re replacing are 2006 models,” Watson said.
Another aspect of the grant, Watson said, is a requirement for the district to use the new buses in the district’s transportation routes. “That’s part of the grant requirement,” Watson said. “They want to come down and see the buses they replaced are actually getting used and not just put to the side.”
Watson said the district will begin working on replacing the buses in early October with a deadline set for March.
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