By T. Scott Boatright
The wheels on the bus go round and round.
And the ride will be more comfortable for many Lincoln Parish students utilizing buses next academic year to travel to school and back home.
That comes after the Lincoln Parish School Board granted permission Tuesday night during its May meeting for LPSB Transportation Supervisor Doc Hoefler to request proposals to add air conditioning to a number of school buses while also improving Hoefler’s request to purchase a bus management system that will allow parents to know where their children’s bus is at any given moment.
“We’re requesting to purchase Samsara software for 80 Lincoln Parish school buses — 68 route buses and 12 activity buses to help with diagnostic maintenance as well as tracking to assure safety for our buses,” Hoefler said. “This will also provide a way for parents to see the location of their student’s bus.”
Hoefler said he is working to arrange a system where parents will be able to download an app to track buses.
“All they should have to do is have the app and then know the bus number that their student is on,” Hoefler said. “We have it on four buses we’ve been using to test it and I can tell you while there might be a very slight lag time, during the rain today I didn’t have to get out into the weather until I saw that a bus was getting close.”
Hoefler said hopes are for the system to be in place and in use at the start of next school year.
“Just as soon as we get permission (Samsara) said they’re ready to go and will have it ready for next school year,” Hoefler said.
Hoefler said the request to air condition more of the LPSB’s bus fleet is a continuing effort.
“We started doing work to retrofit our buses (with air conditioning) last year,” Hoefler said. “We did about 35 last year so we’re requesting the purchase of air-conditioning units of course for cooling purposes during severe heat but also for providing a safer experience for students and drivers.
“So, we’re seeking permission to retrofit 18 of our route buses. Our recommendation is that the board grant permission to the superintendent to issue a request for proposals to purchase and retrofit air-conditioning systems for 18 school buses and that the School Board grant the superintendent permission to accept the lowest bid meeting specifications outlined in the proposal request.”
Hoefler said that along with the 35 buses retrofitted last year five special needs buses and five new buses more recently bought already have air conditioning, the 18 proposed retrofits should make nearly the entire fleet equipped with cooling systems.
“We’ll have five routes that won’t have it, and that’s because those route buses are too old for us to decide to (retrofit), ” Hoefler said. “We are hoping to get that taken care of in the next year or so by purchasing five new buses.”
The LPSB also approved a request from the city of Ruston during the meeting regarding the ongoing Buc-ee’s construction project across Tarbutton Road from Ruston Junior High School that will be a winning situation for the LPSB.
That came after the Board approved a request from the city of Ruston asking the LPSB to make five donations of servitude to maintain the current water and sewer lines and fire hydrants around RJHS and also to extend current water lines for development west of Tarbutton Road.
“Four are water lines, one is a sewer line that goes around Ruston Junior High,” LPSB Superintendent Ricky Durrett said. “In the past we’ve maintained that and the city is asking to take that over and then extend the water line across the street toward Buc-ee’s and further development there.
“It would mean (the city takes) over the water line upkeep, the fire hydrants and all of the maintenance that would go with it, so it’s a win for us and a win for them. They’ll take over that maintenance if we grant the city of Ruston those donations of servitude.”
The LPSB also approved a pair of change orders for ongoing work at the Ruston High School parking lot.
“That parking lot is in front of the Ruston High School gym, and that area was just a big ditch before we built the parking lot there,” said LPSB New Construction Supervisor James Payton. “The (school) district was very fortunate in that we got the dirt to fill that hole at no charge. We probably wouldn’t have been able to do it if we had to buy all that dirt and put it in there.
“And then when we bid it out we got a significantly lower price than what had been allotted for it. So we were very fortunate in those two respects.”
The first change order for the parking lot renovations is to extend the contract for 10 days.
“We needed to have Board approval of this,” Payton said. “You can’t do a change order after the contract date expires. So that’s the reason for that. I talked to the contractor today and we’re basically through with the lot. All we need to do is put the parking bumpers in.”
But in order to complete the parking lot, a large retaining wall connected to a sidewalk had to be removed and the area where it had to be removed from had to be filled with select dirt.
It was also necessary to excavate soft, muddy soil in an area where water was running into the ground underneath the parking lot foundation. Gotech fabric was installed at the bottom of the hole and the area was backfilled with compacted, select fill dirt.
Additional topsoil along the east side of the curb line also had to be added to the parking lot edge.
That change order pushed the price of the work to $13,521.10 with the new total contract price to $178,116.10.
In other business, the LPSB granted permission to bid for duplicating paper as well as gasoline and diesel fuel for the 2025-26 school year, approved Financial Officer’s Juanita Duke’s request to declare four external defibrillators and seven school buses as surplus property because they have been deemed obsolete, and granted permission for Duke to distribute $70,021.25 in 1975 Sale Tax Collection dedicated funds to schools throughout the school district.
Those supply funds are dedicated to be allocated for Music, Art, PE, Science and library supplies, including newspapers and periodicals.
The LPSB agreed with Duke’s request to move some of the funding away from newspapers and periodicals in light of a majority of news being found in this day and age on the internet.
Distributions will be made to each school based on student enrollment as of Oct. 1, 2024.
