A state legislative committee has approved a bill from Assemblymember Esmeralda Soria, D-Merced, that would allow school districts to apply for waivers while working to adopt the state’s 2035 zero-emission school bus mandate.

Assembly Bill 1111 sought an extension to 2045. Amendments adopted by the committee would allow small Local Educational Agencies to apply for a five-year waiver between 2035 and 2040, as well as the ability to apply for an annual waiver between 2040 and 2045.

Amendments made to the bill also remove an option of a proposed waiver based on the response capabilities of local fire agencies.

“As someone who represents rural school districts throughout the Central Valley, the existing timelines are simply not practical,” Soria said in a news release. “These rural districts don’t have the resources, capacity or infrastructure to meet these state-mandated requirements.”

The single five-year waiver, said Soria’s office, is available to all Local Educational Agencies regardless of location or size while the annual waiver opportunity between 2040-2045 will only be available to small Local Educational Agencies and Frontier schools.

In all cases, it is up to the educational agencies to reasonably demonstrate that use of zero-emission school buses is not feasible due to constraints, such as hardships around charging EV buses, route and terrain constraints, or problems with repair and maintenance of zero-emission vehicles.

Soria’s office said waiver requests must be granted by the State Air Resources Board in consultation with the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission, as well as California Department of Education. She called the passing of the bill a win for small and rural communities as school districts across the state face several challenges, especially with federal funding being taken away.

The Merced Union High School District said it currently has 46 buses in its fleet, with six in the process of being phased out. This would leave the district with 40 buses regularly used for transportation of students from home to school as well as transportation for sports and other activities. The district currently has no electric buses in its fleet.

The district said electric school buses do not currently have the range required to cover regular routes as well as the demands of sports, tournaments, various activities and band competitions which are sometimes located in places such as Santa Cruz.

All buses used by the district are used interchangeably for regular routes and special activities.

In an email to the Sun-Star, the district said it does not currently have the necessary infrastructure including charging stations or maintenance and repair facilities to support the implementation of electric buses.

“While plans are being developed to address infrastructure needs, the main issue remains that the current range of electric buses and the infrastructure available across the state do not sufficiently meet the demands of a high school district’s extracurricular activities,” the district said in an email.

A survey of 154 superintendents throughout the state conducted by the California School Boards Association, revealed only 11 percent were “extremely confident” that their educational agencies could make the transition to zero-emission buses by the state mandated deadline of 2035. The survey also revealed that 66 percent of respondents said they were “not so confident” or “not at all confident” their educational agencies would be able to comply with the mandate by the 2035 deadline.

Soria’s office also said there is an unintended consequence of the existing law, with many educational agencies indicating difficulty procuring both conventional and low-emission school buses for routes in which there is no feasible zero-emission option.

“The current EV mandates are simply not practical, and not equitable to our small, rural, and frontier school districts across the state. These are significant barriers that, unless technology sufficiently evolves, threaten LEAs’ ability to provide appropriate transportation options to their students,” said Fernandez.