WESTVILLE — By 2018, Westville Schools may no longer have bus transportation for its students.

During a meeting of the Westville School Board, superintendent Curtiss Strietelmeier told board members he is preparing a transportation waiver for the corporation to eventually allow it to discontinue bus pick up and drop off services for its students.

The waiver does not include special education students.

At the meeting he told board members the corporation's transportation fund has been underfunded for years due to tax caps put in place by the state. He noted that one of his predecessors failed to tax as much as he could the year the cap was put in place due to excess transportation funds the corporation had. It taxed about $200,000 less than it could have that year. Now it is limited at only a 2.3 increase of that underfunded amount.

He said the corporation has been collecting about $200,000 less than it needs each year because of this.

He told board members he hopes the corporation won't have to actually discontinue its services, this waiver will just allow it to discontinue those services if it can no longer afford them in three years.

Strietelmeier noted that matters have been made worse by requirements to keep buses for 12 years. He said the district used to be able to trade buses in sooner using money from its bus funds. Now it has to utilize more money from its transportation funds to maintain them.
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