In the News

In August 2016, House Bill (HB) 2274 was introduced into the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. The proposed legislation would require school districts to utilize a Request for Proposal (RFP) process when awarding transportation contracts and the contracts would automatically expire every 2-3 years.

On April 17, 2016 Governor Tom Wolf signed the medical marijuana bill (Pennsylvania Senate Bill 3) into law, making Pennsylvania the 24th state in the union to legalize the drug for medicinal purposes. According to the law, there are 17 conditions for which marijuana could be used to treat, ranging from chronic pain to epilepsy to cancer. The law will allow up to 25 growers/processors and up to 150 dispensary locations. Because these new enterprises must go through rigorous steps to establish th...

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The Federal District Court in Pennsylvania recently confirmed that drivers, aides, and schools are held to a heightened duty or standard of care when transporting special needs students because such students are more vulnerable to harm. The recent case of K.M. v Chichester School District, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16416, explained that a bus driver’s and aide’s error in leaving an autistic child on the bus at the end of a run and the related lack of appropriate training and policies amounted to “...

IRS Notice 2015-87 was published recently stating that the IRS is considering new rules that will apply to school bus contractors. The new rules will change the methods of calculating which employees are “full time” and will result in more school bus contractors being required to comply with the Affordable Care Act by offering healthcare coverage to its employees. You should know about the proposed new rule and voice your opinion when the IRS seeks public comments.

There are several regulations that govern the transportation of students to and from school, including the general requirements of school buses (75 PA C S 4552), equipment and safety requirements for school buses (67 PA Code 171), and general requirements for other vehicles transporting school children (75 PA C S 4553). All school bus contractors must comply with these regulations as well as others. However, a recent case (CBM Ministries of S Cent Pa, Inc. v Pa DOT) implies that these requiremen...

A new statute, Pennsylvania (24 P.S. 14-1414.2) became effective in January 2015 addressing a school’s administration of EpiPens. As a result many schools are reviewing EpiPen handling expectations with their contractors. In some cases, there is confusion about exactly what the new statute means and how it interacts with an older Pennsylvania statute (42 Pa. C.S. 8337.1) that provides civil immunity in some situations to certain people who render emergency care. This article provides informatio...