Good Morning! First, I would like to thank everyone for their patience and prayers over the course of the past few weeks. Access to safe, reliable transportation for your children is an incredibly important issue, and the manner and timing in which this issue has occurred has been unfortunate. As I mentioned late last week and again, earlier this week, we have been working on a solution and we believe our prayers have been answered.
Last week I received a phone call from SMS alum and St. Michael Parishioner Dusty Fussnecker, who was very concerned about the situation, and wanted to know how he could help. After much discussion with the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, Ohio Department of Education, and several bus companies about details, insurance concerns, with safety as our number one priority, we are excited to announce that Fussnecker and Sons has agreed to purchase a school bus for us to use at St. Michael to help as many families as possible who live in school districts that are not legally responsible to provide transportation for their children to SMS. Obviously this is an incredibly generous donation, and we are extremely grateful to Fussnecker and Sons for helping our families in this situation.
We are also working on finding a driver. One of our parents has already begun the process of getting the training and credentials needed to drive a bus, and we will not rush that. In the meantime, if anyone knows someone who has all of the proper credentials to drive a school bus, and would like to help us out in the short term, following fair break, and possibly as a sub driver, please have them contact me at the school office. I am also planning to become licensed when I have some time to complete the training.
To be clear the Georgetown bus will continue to run it's normal route as usual, as obligated by state law, and all students who reside in the Georgetown school district should continue to ride it. Mr. Heslar does a fantastic job, and we appreciate his service. The same goes for the Ripley bus, it will continue to run as normal, and RULH residents should continue to use this bus service.
For any of our families who reside in Fayetteville, White Oak, Eastern Brown, Western Brown, Bethel-Tate, Felicity, Adams County, or any other district which is not legally obligated to bus, this is for you. We are still working on logistics and stops, and we will report more information in the coming weeks. There will also be a small bus fee that will be assessed by family, but I assure you, it will not be close to what was suggested last week. We will do all we can to make it as reasonable as possible for our families. We are still doing some research and when we have those numbers we will get them to you as soon as possible. If you have not yet done so, I encourage you to call your school district and ask about transportation, or payment in lieu of transportation. Eastern has already indicated that they are ready to acknowledge their obligation to pay families for transportation costs, which would help pay for the cost of the new SMS bus.
In the meantime, it is very important that we figure out how many children we will need to plan for. When you have a second, please send me an email at andy.arn@stmichaelripley.com to let me know if you plan to use the bus.
Remember, this is the last day that out of district students may ride the Georgetown bus. I apologize that you will have to make alternate arrangements for next week, but hopefully after fair week, this will all be settled. Again, thank you for your patience and prayers.