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'I a SCHOOL TRANSPORTATION POLICY Busing to be revised In the spirit -STUDENTS at St. John the Evangelist school had their own Olympie excitement as they carried torches aroundtheschoollastweek. FreePressphoto Durham. Board of Education. trustees voted almost unanimiously Monday night to approve a revised transoortation policy that will lead to busing, in the next school year,' of about 1,100 more students, including 650 in French.immersion. With the exception of Oshawa trustee Cathy O'Flynn, who said she was "really dismayed" at the change in policy which will mean added transportation cost, all trustees favored the new policy that will now bus urban, and not just rural, students who live beyond.certain distances to their home school. The policy will now be circulated for review and comment by school principals and parent groups before coming before the board for finvl approval, expected in April. Urder changes, elementary students living more than 1.6 kilometres from their designated school and high school students living more than 3.2 kilometres from their designated school are entitled to transportation. There is also transportation prôvided for certain cases,¯ such as identified special education students or areas where there are safety concerns for distances less than tiose established in the policy. Jack Upton, " manager of transportation, says the policy, once approved, will provide- busing for four Whitby schools which previously had no busing, including F.M. Heard, the French immersion schol. Other schools are Kathleen Rowe, Pringle Creek and R.A. Hutchison while Dr. Robert Thornton will get more busing than previously. In the region as a whole, 12 more schools will have busing. In total, 480 students in the regular program will be bussed and 650 French immersion students. A total of 29 more buses will be contracted, says Upton. The added transportation cost will be $495ï350 for the last four months of 1988 and $1.2 million for all of 1989. O'Flynn had argued . that Town portion of tax bill will go up 7.5% The average ratepayer in urban Whitby can expect to pay an additional'$35.75 in the Town portion of their tax bill this year while the increase for rural residents will be $31.35. Whitby council approved tax increases of 7.5 per cent for urban ratepayers and 7.4 per cent for rural following two sessions of budget discussions last· week. The average taxpayer can now expect to pay, $509.30 in taxes for general municipal purposes in. the 1988 year, according to deputy treasurer Sandra Cartwright. That amount is based on a $5,500 assessment. Staff' had recommended a 7.9-per cent tax increase for urban residents and 7.8 per cent for rural but councillors cut $40,000 from the budget during discussion. But two motions, one by councillor Gerry Emm and the other by west ward councillor Joe Bugelli, each calling for an- additional $100,000 to be added to the budget, were defeated. Emm's budget called for $100,000 to be added to the public works department for the conversion of gravel roads to hard-top. The $100,000 would have increated taxes by another one per cent. Emm said the money was needed ta start the work but he didn't say where. . Whitby has 45 km. of gravel roads and to convert one kilometer from gravel to hardtop woúld cost $45,000. "I could think of a lot other places to spend $100,000, .for example, sidewalks," said councillor Marcel Brunelle while Mayor Bob Attersley asked that councillors "strongly defeat the motion." He said Emm should pursue his motion . through a Town committee. "You bave to start somewhere," replied Emm, just before his motion was resoundingly defeated. Bugelli, at 11:45 p.m. last Wednesday, then suggested $100,000 for the construction of sidewalks in town. "It must be the lateness of the hour affecting your mind," commented councillor Joe Drumm. "It is ludicrous to pick a $100,000 figure out of a hat and put it into sidewalks or where ever. Let's get a report in," said councillor Ross Batten. But just before the motion was defeated, Bugelli said he made the suggestion to show how ludicrous "it is to do that," referring to Emm's earlier motion. SEE PAGE 3 money for transportation "doesn't contribute to the educational system." She also maintainéd that French immersion, which she said had prompted a policy change, was an "optional" educational program for which parents should provide their own transportation. Those comments were echoed in a letter to the board from an Oshawa resident, Michael Eno. "I think spending on this board is going out of control," said O'Flynn. "We're really going to be in deep trouble. "You have bowed to pressure," she told trustees. "You may regret it in a few years." Whitby trustee Ian, Brown; who had previously amended a motion by Pickering trustee Lorna Murphy so that the whole policy would be revised, said he supported the policy despité his . belief that students, who got no more exercise "than to turn the channel on the television," could walk a greater distance than is in the policy. Hé also said he hoped the policy would enable Upton to make the decisions rather than having the board deal with concerns. Trustee Rutb Lafarga said it was "idealistic" to believe that the board's problems are over, predicting that there will be "lots of delegations" of parents. "I don't see why we're patting ourselves on the back," she said. She said several other boards are also reviewing their transportation .policies, indicating that "The world of transportation is constantly changing." JEREMIA JOHNSON, 7, of Whitby, this year's.area Timmy, and Melanie Thompson, 9, are among the 80 volunteers who prepared envelopes last week at the Durham Regional Police station in Whitby for this year's Easter Seal campaigninWhitby an Sports news See pages14&15 1