In his 17-year career as a bus driver, Chris Johnson of Chilton County Schools in Alabama is familiar with the statistics of illegal school bus passing. But he has only seen the violation occur twice — once while subbing on another driver’s route and once on video.
At a recent driver training session, Johnson watched a video in which a West Virginia student getting off the school bus and crossing the street is narrowly missed by an oncoming, passing car. It was not until he saw the near miss that he decided it was time for him to do something about the dangers of illegal passing.
“I guess I’m a visual learner. That kind of got my attention a little more than just the number of 2,000 times illegal passes in Alabama a day,” he said. “My brain finally kicked into gear after watching this (video) and knowing this number for 17 years.”
“I said to our instructor, ‘You know, we really need to try and get some media publicity out about the fact that this many times every average day a school bus is (passed illegally),” he added.
Johnson, who has also worked as a broadcaster since the age of 14, decided to produce a 60-second radio public service announcement (PSA) to bring awareness to the problem and to remind motorists of the hefty consequences that come with passing a stopped school bus with an extended stop-arm and red flashing lights.
As the owner of a local radio station, co-owner of another and an independent contractor who does engineering jobs for several other stations, he said “knew he could get all of them to run it (PSA) without any question.”
The next challenge came when he decided to present his idea to the Alabama Broadcasters Association, of which he is a member, during the annual business meeting last August. He hoped to get more stations to pick up the PSA that way.
Johnson presented the results from the latest Alabama Department of Education survey at the meeting, which indicated that throughout the state, 1,713 cars illegally passed a school bus in one day. These figures only represented the districts and drivers that actually participated in the voluntary survey.
“Their jaws dropped when we went through the numbers,” Johnson said.
The ABA board said that although they did not typically distribute PSAs for free, this issue was important enough to them to warrant an exception.
According to Johnson, approximately a dozen radio stations throughout the state have picked up the spot and “it is taking off like wildfire,” having received media coverage from numerous local television stations and newspapers.
He said that in his career as a bus driver, he has rarely witnessed any cars passing his bus because his loading and unloading occurs in parking lots, as he picks up students at a local high school and drops them off at a nearby career technical center. However, an incident occurred when he was substituting for another driver that made him realize just how much awareness is needed about school bus stop laws.
“I subbed for a different route. The bus was stopped. A student got off and stayed on the right side of the street. The stop sign was out and a car passed the bus on the left. The two cars behind him were state troopers and flashed the lights on him and pulled him over,” he said.
“So I said to my students, who were juniors and seniors, ‘Well, that guy just got himself a ticket.’ A couple of them said, ‘For what?’ I said, ‘He ran the stop sign on the school bus,’ and they said, ‘You’re not supposed to do that?’”
Johnson said the success of the PSA has exceeded his expectations.
“I kicked the ball and it’s rolled farther than I thought it would roll,” he said.
“I’m hoping that we’re getting some folks’ attention,” he continued. “If it gets somebody to stop at one stop and saves one life, it’s worth every bit of it.”
Passing a stopped school bus with an extended stop-arm and red lights flashing is illegal in all 50 states.
