Just ask any teacher or faculty member, it’s time. It’s BACK TO SCHOOL. And you’re seeing plenty of school busses traveling around. That means you’re going to need to be extra careful. Here’s a quick refresher on what to do when coming up on a school bus dropping off or picking kids up.
You’d think it’s a “no-brainer: if you see a school bus pull over, their lights come on and the stop sign swings out from the side, you stop, right? Well, one violation of this particular statute is too many. So, what are we talking about here?
Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt has an overview, “When you’re approaching a school bus, either from the front or the rear and it’s displaying its flashing red warning lights and that bus is completely stopped, you must stop your vehicle and wait for the bus to resume motion or to extinguish those red flashing lights.”
Think about it, if a bus is stopping, it’s because there are kids around either being picked up or dropped off.
Schmidt says, “Kids are smaller, they tend to dart onto the traffic, and we want traffic to come to a complete stop and make sure that all the kids make it to school safely. Nobody gets into a crash. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a regular vehicle or if you’re an emergency vehicle, it’s red and blue lights going. You need to come to a stop and wait for those individuals walking across the road.”
And just because you don’t see an officer anywhere around, don’t think you can get away with violating this.
“Within 24 hours, if a school bus operator has seen a violation of this statute, they can report it to the law enforcement agency responsible, so a citation can be issued for what’s called ‘Owner’s liability for a vehicle illegally passing a school bus’,” explains Schmidt.
And it doesn’t matter if you as the owner weren’t driving.
“Really what that statue is intended to do is to try and get the person who was driving because if an owner doesn’t want that citation, they will turn over who was actually driving the vehicle at the time.”
The idea behind that is if they can’t establish who was actually driving, the citation can still be served because as a car owner, you are ultimately responsible for where your vehicle is at all times. So, what’s the damage if you violate this?
Schmidt explains, “The fine for this offense is $326.50 and four points against your driver’s license. And that dollar amount pales in comparison to if you were to strike a child, you certainly could face potential of criminal penalties as well as civil liability, which is going to be much more expensive than that $326 citation.”
Not to mention the feeling of guilt you’d have of hitting a child.
To find out more info about the Wisconsin DOT’s School Bus Safety program click here.
