School Transportation News 2010 Buyer's Guide : Page 150School Transportation News Magazine | Buyer’s Guide 2010 Commentary No Matter the Headlines, 2010 Figures to be a Tough Year By Ryan Gray Three days before Thanksgiving, news reports her- alded that the “Great Recession” was finally over. Economists at Citigroup Inc., had just upgraded the 2010 economic growth forecasts for the U.S. and several other countries and declared that most all major economies had emerged from recession in the second and third quarters of fiscal year 2009. Meanwhile, the National Association for Business Economics released data that forecast unemploy- ment would bottom out in the first quarter of 2010, and then employers would being hiring again. The U.S. Commerce Department had announced the economy grew by 3.5 percent in October. Could it be that good times were around the corner? Quickly, it became evident that the silver lining had a bit of rust on it. Days after the Commerce Department report, it revised its GDP figures to only 2.8 percent growth. Meanwhile, the National Association for Business Economics tempered its forecast by adding that consumer spending would remain sluggish. And then you had the chief of the International Mon- etary Fund cautioning that the global economy was still fragile and vulnerable. This was all about a week after headlines were made on the campus of UCLA as students protest- ed a 32 percent tuition hike passed by the UC Board of Regents effective in the fall. It got me thinking (uh-oh, I know): what kind of protests might we see if ever widescale school busing fell victim to state budget disasters? True, the ideology, emotion and youth of univer- sity students are the makings of any good dissent. But it’s highly unlikely we’d ever see riot police out in force to quell some kind of public outcry over a community losing school bus rides for its children. In fact, cities and towns across the nation formany years now have seen school bus service eliminated altogether, especially in California. It’s no less true today, and it’s expected to worsen in the new year. But, lest we forget, it was not that long ago that the National Guard was called upon by President Kennedy to escort black children to school in the south, some via school bus. It also must be noted that old wounds of racism have been reopened as more and more states move away from desegrega- tion busing in favor of more neighborhood school- 150 ing. On the same day as the aforementioned eco- nomic indicators were released, Nov. 23, the FBI published a report that showed hate crimes rose more than 8 percent in 2008, a increase of four fold over 2007. Times remain extremely challenging, even down- right sad, in a variety of ways. And things figure to get even worse before it gets better. With more and more families experiencing fi- nancial hardships due to job loss, home foreclo- sures, higher local and state taxes, and, generally, less disposable income, schools are being asked to do more and more to help get students to and from school. But tapped out itself, schools are re- ducing and eliminating routes, extending rider eli- gibility distances from school. And things appear to be getting worse before they get better. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), a national research and analysis non-profit, found in mid November that 26 states and the District of Columbia had enacted cuts to K-12 education in re- sponse to shrinking tax revenue exacerbated by the recession. Meanwhile, all but Montana and North Dakota addressed or are facing budget shortfalls of $190 billion. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that state tax collections fell 17 percent in the second quarter of 2009, the worst decline ever. And 40 states are forecasting additional budget deficits in 2011. The result: expect higher taxes in 2010. All of these state and local cuts, of course, have a direct impact on transportation, because no school board wants to be the one responsible for taking from the classroom any more money than is necessary. Not very good news for an industry that traditionally lags one year behind in feeling the worst effects of a struggling economy. While this is the worst economic landscape since the Great Depression, pupil transporters are a sea- soned bunch, used to being maligned by a variety of issues, under-funding merely one of them. I sus- pect the industry will continue to do what it has always done:make lemonade out of lemons. We’re certainly far from out of the woods. But, I imagine, with the passion exhibited each and every day by those who work in both the public and pri- vate school transportation sectors, everything just might beOK. Eventually. n EDITOR’S COMMENTARY : NO MATTER THE HEADLINES, 2010 FIGURES TO BE A TOUGH YEARRYAN GRAYThree days before Thanksgiving, news reports heralded that the “Great Recession” was finally over. Publication List |
