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You may have heard that here in NYC there has been significant problems with school busing – kids not getting bus service, kids not getting picked up, kids on the bus for ridiculously long trips. Today the City Council held an open hearing and solicited written remarks. Since Alex and I have shared in this “experience” I sent the following to Speaker Quinn.
My son, Alex, is 14 years old. He has autism and ulcerative colitis. We live on the Upper East Side, on 94th street. Alex’s school is on 120th and Madison (1.6 miles), about 5 minutes in a cab ($10). On his IEP he has a short bus route with transportation para and A/C (Alex has many sensory issues, dietary issues and is non-verbal).
When school started this past September Alex did not have any bus route. The school site (P79) worked with us to get Alex a bus route. We refused the suggested route and are still awaiting another. The reason for the refusal – two hours, that is the length of the route. Alex would have been picked up at 6:15am and dropped off between 8:15 and 8:30am each morning. Similar trip on the way home. For any child, let alone a special needs child with health issues, this is unacceptable.
Additionally the financial burden of having to use cabs is extensive. If we cab each way the monthly bill would be $800. Luckily it is difficult to access cab service at 120th (yet another issue) so we have to walk home each day. This lowers the cost of the route but requires time away from work for dad. In the pleasant weather this is actually ok, once the weather turns nasty I have to consider keeping Alex home simply because the DOE/NYC cannot get him to school in the appropriate manner as indicated on his IEP.
It should be an embarrassment that the supposed “greatest city in the world”, cannot deliver a special needs child 1.6 miles to school in less than two hours. If the people responsible for this “service” had to compete in the private sector, they would be unemployed.
