With slightly over a month left in the school year, Castaic Union School District staff alerted families that, due to staff shortages and personnel matters, the district can no longer provide home-to-school transportation for the remainder of the school year.
Charmin Ortega, executive assistant to the superintendent, and Irene Boden, assistant superintendent of business and administrative services, confirmed on Tuesday morning that there was a message sent to district families through ParentSquare alerting them the district could no longer provide general education students with home-to-school transportation.
“We would like to provide you with an update to the transportation availability for the remainder of the school year. We recognize the burden that it places on our families when we are not able to facilitate transportation and we thank you in advance for your flexibility during these unforeseen circumstances,” read the ParentSquare message. “Due to staffing shortages and personnel matters, our workforce in our transportation department has been greatly reduced. Because of this, we will be unable to provide home-to-school transportation for the remainder of the 2024-25 school year. Please note this does not include our special education routes. Those routes will continue to operate as normal.”
Boden said the district has been discussing this issue for some time now with parents and has been updating them along the way as the department navigates the unforeseen circumstances.
As The Signal reported in July 2024, the district was expecting to be able to provide a fully operational transportation department this school year based off its budget. Boden wrote in an emailed statement that the district had hoped to be able to provide more home-to-school transportation.
She said in a phone interview on Tuesday that, at the beginning of the school year, the district had a total of seven bus drivers. Due to personnel issues, the district is now down to two bus drivers with the potential of a third after the new driver completes the training process, but it isn’t enough to open all the routes.
Before spring break, approximately in February, Boden said the district began telling families about the transportation issues coming up because the number of staff was reducing and it could affect transportation.
In April, she said they had two more bus drivers leave and that is when the district had to make the decision to divert drivers where they were more prioritized based off California Education Code.
California Education Code states that transportation for special education students is considered a related service and is provided as necessary to access special education instruction and services. This includes travel to and from school, between schools, and within school buildings.
“We understand this is really hard, but we’re doing what we can with the staff we have,” said Boden.
She added that the district recognized this is not an ideal situation and praised the families for being understanding about the situation. She said the district will continue to update parents as officials come up with a solution for the next school year.
“We are actively working on a solution to provide home-to-school transportation for the upcoming 2025-26 school year. In preparation for this, we will be opening up bus applications to all families beginning in mid- to late-May through our online platform, Informed K12,” read the ParentSquare message. “The applications will be available to complete through our website. Filling out an application does not guarantee transportation for next year, but will establish a list of students for possible transportation for the new school year.”
