Buses, buses everywhere, but not enough for the kids?

We would guess that was what Manteca city officials were thinking when they took the initiative to support a Manteca mother of three, Tuowanda Salgado, and her petition to get transportation for her neighborhood children after Manteca Unified School District officials reduced busing this year.

Even though Salgado has put her children into a carpool to get to and from Veritas School, she decided someone had to speak up for the children whose voices were silenced by adults. She went door to door and made a difference. She took her petition, signed by 125 folks, to the Manteca City Council and asked, “What are you going to do about it?”

Kudos to Mayor Willie Weatherford for taking the petition and running with Salgado’s plea for help. He pushed city staff to arrange by the first day of school, Aug. 10, for a couple of city transportation buses to pick up kids in the Woodward Avenue area who attend Veritas and Sierra High School.

So far, the month-long experiment seems to be going well, and kids and parents are using the buses. The cost is about $400 to the city.

However, it remains to be seen if this project will continue and the routes restructured to accommodate these students on a permanent basis. That decision will be made by the City Council in September, officials said.

As for the rest of the MUSD students going without transportation, it’s sad and unfair.

The city is providing a service the MUSD can’t afford to provide, and kids attending Lathrop and French Camp schools without transportation, like Lathrop High School, can likely forget the idea that their city will take up this financial burden.

It’s great that Manteca officials did this good deed, but parents in need of student transportation should ask themselves if is it fair these children receive special treatment?

It is, in a way, because Woodward had a parent who wouldn’t take no for an answer.