Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the School Transportation topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Great Neck district outlines corrective plan after state review; will grandfather current riders and suspend referendum
Summary
Following a review by the New York State Comptroller's office, Great Neck Union Free School District said it is taking incremental steps to bring transportation into compliance with state rules, will grandfather existing out-of-zone riders and is not moving forward with a voter referendum to change mileage limits.
Dr. Bossa, superintendent of Great Neck Union Free School District, told a district transportation forum that an Office of the State Comptroller (OSC) review prompted changes intended to bring bus operations into compliance with state law and district policy. "Either you qualify for transportation service or you do not," she said, explaining the district removed a policy reference to "courtesy bus passes" and clarified that childcare bus passes follow a documented application process.
The district emphasized why it acted quickly. The OSC's Division of Local Government and School Accountability conducted interviews and financial reviews this spring and early summer and identified the district's transportation eligibility criteria as a focus of concern. Dr. Bossa said the OSC acknowledged the district's proactive corrective actions and suspended the audit to allow a longer "glide path" for changes.
Why this matters: the decisions affect thousands of students who rely on district transportation and carry budget implications. The district reported about 9,100 students (public and private) enrolled, with roughly 90% receiving some form of transportation; about 2,200 are private-school riders now attending 84 different private schools. The district said its transportation appropriation in the school budget is about $18,000,000, with approximately $16,000,000 going to contracted services; that contract amount rose roughly $652,000 (about a 3.7% increase) from the prior year.
What the district will do: administrators said they will (1) enforce application deadlines (April 1 for private-school applications), (2) stop accepting new applications for schools that do not meet the district's legal eligibility limits while allowing existing riders to be grandfathered through their enrollment, and (3) pursue incremental route and policy adjustments rather than implementing all changes at once. "We will not be returning to actual driveways for each child to be picked up," Dr. Bossa said, citing state standards that require bus stops be set equally for similarly situated students and noting special-education Individualized Education Program (IEP) requirements remain unaffected.
Board and staffing context: the superintendent said the district authorized an added administrative position in transportation during a planned leadership transition; Jim Gineris has been serving in an interim supervisory role to preserve institutional knowledge while a permanent supervisor is hired. The district also said it has contracted with routing vendors, including School Source Technologies, and continues its partnership with its contractor, We Transport.
Next steps and outreach: administrators said families who currently receive transportation will be notified if their child's school has been identified as ineligible under the corrected criteria and that notifications and an online intake (via a Google form QR code provided at the forum) will be used to collect and resolve individual cases. The district asked parents with specific route or eligibility concerns to submit details so staff can review each request individually.
Sources and quotations in this report come from speakers at the Great Neck transportation forum, including Dr. Bossa (superintendent), Jim Gineris (transportation supervisor), and district counsel Kevin Block.
