City officials are contemplating whether to give local school districts the authority to issue civil citations to drivers who pass stopped school buses while children are entering or exiting.

If the council passes an ordinance allowing civil citations, school districts could partner with companies that affix surveillance cameras near the articulating stop signs on the buses used when children are getting on and off the bus.

The council considered such action in June 2014 but ultimately let the issue die. Dallas and Austin are the only major Texas cities that have granted such authority to school districts.

“Time is of the essence,” wrote council members Alan Warrick and Ray Lopez in a council-consideration request. “The risk of injury or death to our most precious resource — our children — is far too great to sit idle while other municipalities have successfully proven the ability to increase compliance and thus security and safety around school buses.”

Yet in San Antonio, apparently there’s not been a single injury or fatality associated with drivers passing school buses while loading or unloading children, which is a violation of state law.

In the past three years, San Antonio police officers have ticketed 418 drivers for the criminal violation. According to the state transportation code, fines for illegally passing school buses run from $500 to $1,250.

Those tickets are criminal citations, much like speeding tickets. Deputy City Manager Erik Walsh told the council’s Governance Committee recently that the legality of the civil citations is still murky.

“The uncertainty that came up three or four years ago still exists from staff’s standpoint, and that’s whether or not under state law civil citations are allowed for this type of infraction,” he said. “There have been bills that have been proposed on both ends of the argument, and none of them have passed. And so I suspect in the next legislative session, we will see that again.”

In Dallas and Austin, drivers face $300 civil citations. Walsh said the companies that partner with districts would collect 100 percent of fines until they recoup costs for equipment, and then they would share revenue with the school districts.

In Dallas, drivers can appeal through the city. In Austin, the city isn’t involved at all.

Walsh said city staff’s recommendation is to follow a path similar to Austin’s. The city would pass an enabling ordinance and then the school districts would decide whether to proceed and negotiate their own deals with the companies.

But the city would require that the school districts provide an appeals process for contested tickets and that any revenue they receive would fund enhancements to student safety. Among other things, that could be additional crossing guards or crosswalk improvements.

Councilmen Mike Gallagher and Joe Krier, both members of the Governance Committee, said they fully support the idea and want to proceed quickly so school districts could implement the technology by the next school year.

Councilman Ron Nirenberg said he has concerns about handing over ticketing authority to private enterprises.

“School zone safety should be the top priority for public dollars, and there is an inherent conflict in that priority when you mix in a profit motive for a nonpublic entity,” he said. “Our goal should be to reduce the revenue coming in from such violations so that we’re actually improving safety, whereas the goal for the company would be to keep churning in these violators.”

If the council passes the ordinance, it would be effective within city boundaries only. School buses cross municipal lines into more than a dozen suburban cities that would also have to enact similar legislation in order for a school district to be blanketed.

The council is expected to consider the issue and could make a final decision before the end of June.

jbaugh@express-news.net

Twitter: @jbaugh