For most, the end of construction in and around a residential area is a good thing. For some parents of elementary-aged children in Mission Oaks, however, the end of construction meant the end of bus transportation for students at Barbara Jordon Elementary School.
Some parents have questioned why the elementary school students can no longer ride the bus, but neighborhood students attending Bush High School still get a ride from the district.
According to FBISD officials, transportation was provided to the southern end of the neighborhood because ongoing construction projects made the area hazardous by the state’s definition.
Bush students living in the same area are provided bus transportation because they have to cross Hwy. 1464 – which is considered a hazardous route.
So, for Mission Bend elementary school parents, no hazard equals no transportation.
One resident, who will not be named to protect the identity of his foster children, is raising four foster children that came from a home where their mother did not send them to school or feed them.
He said the lack of transportation has been a hardship for his family.
“These were kids that were staved almost to death and we are trying to nurture them and get them back on schedule,” he said of the children, ages 9, 7, 4 and 3.
He has tried to enroll the 4-year-old in Jordon’s pre-kindergarten program, but said the program has been full for the five years he and his wife have lived in the area. According to the district, there are 60 students on the waiting list.
He was told that there are opening at several Missouri City schools, including Blue Ridge, Hunters Glen, Ridgegate, EA Jones (Bilingual only) and Ridgemont.
Unfortunately, due to due to the Federal Transportation Guidelines requiring special constraints for young children, FBISD along with most other Houston-area school districts, does not provide transportation for half-day PreK.
The family seems to be stuck between a rock and a hard place.
“We have enough of a nightmare trying to get these kids to the school that’s over here,” he said, adding that restricted parking and heavy traffic delays at the beginning and end of the school day add to the headache.
He said that while the roadways may not be hazardous to the children walking to school, the 51 registered sex offenders within a 3-mile radius of the school could be.
To some, that may seem like a high number, but a check through the Texas Department of Public Safety reveals that it is more the middle of the pack.
FBISD’s Blue Ridge Elementary, in Houston, has 107 registered sex offenders within a three-mile radius of the school. Scanlan Oaks Elementary in Missouri City has three.
The State of Texas allows the parole board to set parameters as to how close sex offenders can live to places where children commonly gather, such as schools.
However, municipalities have the ability to create ordinances that are stricter than the state law. The City of Richmond has such as ordinance, which prohibits level one sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school as long as they are on probation. Leven two and three sex offenders are prohibited indefinitely from living within 1,000 feet from a school.
The registered sex offender living closest to Jordon Elementary is .22 miles away, barely outside the city’s ordinance, which amounts to .189 miles.
Join me on September 13, 2010…expressing my concerns at the next board meeting regarding Transportation…the squeaky wheel gets the oil…and it about time for ours to get some. Remember you have to submit your request to address our board elect by 6:45 pm the day of the meeting, so plan to arrive a little early to get that request in before the deadline.
All meetings are held in the FBISD Administration Building, 16431 Lexington Blvd, Sugar Land, at 7 p.m. unless otherwise noted.
The public needs to wakeup an increase voters turnouts, in order for FBISD to increase bus service. Withholding low FBISD voters turn outs, thence FBISD will cut bus services.
This is sad. I heard the district cut quite a bit of the transportation budget last year. I wonder if this impacted this community too on this decision?