Bus-glitch kids in a lurch
A bus company stranded scores of disabled students for hours this week, thanks to a Department of Education glitch over bus routes.
Parents of specialneeds students had to drop their children off at New York Institute for Special Education in The Bronx or make other arrangements because the school’s bus company, the All American School Bus Corp., was several hours late picking up students.
“It was like September all over again,” said one parent, who declined to give his name. “Every body was everywhere. They had a new bus company with new drivers and new matrons. They did not know the routes.”
Queens mom Lisa Freitag, 47, took the day off from work on Monday to care for her 7yearold blind daughter, Kailee, when the bus did not arrive for its usual 7:30 a.m. pickup. A bus company representative told her she was “not on their route anymore.”
She left her daughter with a neighbor on Tuesday when the bus failed to arrive again.
The buses did not pick up stu dents at the end of the school day, forcing the school to send some children home in cabs.
A Department of Education spokeswoman said the agency reassigned bus routes on Monday and acknowledged some buses arrived late.
Repeated calls to All American requesting comment were met with a busy tone.
Freitag said school officials told her Tuesday a bus will pick her daughter up at 7:48 a.m. on Wednesday. “We shall see,” she said. Georgett Roberts, Aaron Short