Kent School District outlines four‑phase plan to reduce student walk boundaries to one mile

Kent School District transportation officials presented a four‑phase plan to gradually reduce student walk boundaries to a one‑mile maximum and described the staffing, mileage and near‑term budget implications.

Justin Denison, Director of Transportation, told the school board that a November “what‑if” scenario showed 1,800 more students would become eligible for bus service if the district moved to a one‑mile walk boundary. “If we moved our boundaries from their current distances to 1 mile, which is what the state reimburses districts for, what it would take for us to operate at that level,” Denison said at the work session.

Denison said that earlier modeling from November estimated adding 29 additional runs and 17 bus routes and that updated cost assumptions raised the district’s per‑bus operating estimate. Using the district’s revised 2024–25 inputs — a mileage rate of $4.40 per mile and a blended driver cost of $42.70 per hour (wages plus benefits) — Denison said an average route of 11,342 miles per year and an average driver day of 6.9 hours yields roughly $105,000 per route annually.

To reach the one‑mile…