To help reduce a state budget deficit of more than $216 million, Gov. Jack Markell is proposing that school districts shoulder 10 percent of the state reimbursement costs for school bus routing.

Delaware currently reimburses all school systems at 100 percent of funding for transportation services. That figure is $87.8 million for the 2009-2010 school year. If the proposal makes it through the legislature, the state’s school districts would have to share 10 percent of the routing costs, or slightly than $7 million, according to the state Department of Education.

Last year, a proposal by the governor to reduce state school transportation reimbursement to 75 percent was defeated in the legislature.

Gov. Markell’s latest proposal would also affect charter school transportation. A DOE spokesperson said the current formula consists of dividing the previous year’s transportation expenditures for each of the county vocational schools by the number of students transported to determine the cost of transportation per student. Charter schools currently receive funding based on 75 percent of each county’s negotiated or bid transportation cost multiplied by the number of students eligible for the school bus service. Gov. Markell’s proposal would reduce that funding to 70 percent times the number of school-bus-eligible students.

The DOE spokesperson added that all school districts currently utilize Trapeze Software for bus routing.