Paramus school bus crash: Where does the buck stop when it comes to safety?

Curtis Tate | NorthJersey

Show Caption Hide Caption Deadly NJ school bus crash on Route 80 in Mount Olive A Paramus school bus crashed on Route 80 in Mount Olive, killing two and injuring others. The bus appeared mangled and the incident shut down the Interstate.

The federal government has the authority to regulate, and punish, the trucking company involved in last month’s fatal Paramus school bus crash. It does not, however, have regulatory power over the school district that owns and operates the bus.

State agencies regulate the licensing of school bus drivers and the inspection of school buses. But the public has little information about how New Jersey's school districts are held accountable when they fail to meet those requirements.

The May 17 crash, which killed a student and a teacher, exposed a regulatory gap that leaves it up to states to oversee the bus operations of public school districts without the same level of transparency, or the same punitive power, as the federal agencies charged with overseeing private motor carriers.

Open Public Records Act requests to multiple state and local governmental bodies paint an incomplete picture of who is responsible for school bus safety and what price they pay when they fall short.

Little information

The Paramus Board of Education, as a government entity, is exempt from Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration regulations. Consequently, there is more publicly available information about the safety record of the dump truck operator, Mendez Trucking, and companies like it, than there is about the more than 600 public school districts statewide.

The school bus driver, Hudy Muldrow Sr., was charged with two counts of vehicular homicide, according to an affidavit filed May 24 by the New Jersey State Police.

The affidavit states that Muldrow was attempting to make an illegal U-turn in the median of Interstate 80 in Mount Olive when the dump truck struck it on the left side in the rear.

A 10-year-old student, Miranda Vargas, and a 51-year-old teacher, Jennifer Williamson-Kennedy, died as a result of the crash. They were on a field trip to Waterloo Village, a historic settlement, from East Brook Middle School in Paramus. The bus was owned and operated by the school district.

The Record and NorthJersey.com found that Muldrow's license had been suspended 14 times, most recently in December. The 77-year-old had received eight speeding tickets and was once cited for careless driving.

Muldrow was released from jail, and his next court appearance is scheduled for June 25.

The driver of the dump truck, who has not been identified, has not been charged.

Who's in charge?

The absence of publicly available information about the safety of school bus operations in New Jersey leaves parents, teachers and students wondering where the buck stops.

The Record and NorthJersey.com have submitted multiple Open Public Records Act requests to the state Department of Education, the Motor Vehicle Commission and the Paramus Board of Education in an attempt to find out more about what officials knew about Muldrow's record.

The state Motor Vehicle Commission can suspend or deny a school bus driver's endorsement if the driver has accumulated 12 or more motor vehicle violation points.

Certain medical conditions, including diabetes, vision loss, heart disease and anything that could cause a loss of consciousness, could disqualify a school bus driver.

Muldrow and other school bus drivers are required by state law to submit a medical fitness certificate every two years. According to a letter sent from the state Department of Education to the Paramus schools superintendent in December and obtained by The Record and NorthJersey.com through a public records request, his medical certificate had expired.

Just a month later, however, the state cleared Muldrow to transport children, advising Paramus that he "is eligible to operate a school bus."

A price to pay?

The Motor Vehicle Commission has what it describes as one of the most rigorous school bus inspection programs in the country. The agency conducts thorough inspections of 78,000 vehicles twice a year at 1,300 locations statewide. Among other items, the agency examines driver employment records.

School districts are required to submit state and federal background checks for bus driver applicants to the state Department of Education.

Districts can be fined $250 if they fail to maintain an updated copy of a bus driver's work history. The initial application must include 10 years of work history.

An MVC spokeswoman couldn't initially say whether the Paramus Board of Education had ever paid such a fine or how frequently the agency fines districts statewide.

In 2015, the most recent year of data available, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration collected $33 million in fines from the companies it regulates.

While federal rules for the licensing of school bus drivers apply to public school districts, the transportation of students by those districts to and from school, and on field trips or to athletic events, is exempt.

Federal motor carrier regulations do apply to private contract bus operators that run school buses for some school systems. Such bus carriers account for about 35 percent of school bus operations nationwide. Their safety records can be found on the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's website.

School districts own and operate about 65 percent of the school buses nationwide.

School bus accident data for school districts that own and operate their own bus fleets, however, are not as easily accessible.

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