The good news first. The federal Clean School Bus Program (CSBP), the one that has funded 8,700 electric school buses (ESBs) in 1,200 rural, urban and suburban school districts, Tribal nations and territories, is finally resuming (albeit in a misguided way, see below, but that’s not the bad news).
Staying positive here, I just registered for the CSBP webinar on Tuesday, March 3rd at 11 a.m. Pacific, 2 p.m. Eastern, and I hope you will, too. The EPA is gathering public input at this webinar as part of its Request For Information on how to craft the program anew.
The bad news lies in the bigger picture, beyond ESBs, and relates to ICE. As I reported earlier, the overarching mission of the nation’s 480,000 school buses, that of safe, steady access to school, is being threatened by ICE’s often warrantless (illegal) arrests of people. It invaded a school bus stop earlier this year for an arrest. That was consistent with its January 2025 announcement that it was planning such activities.
I love school buses on principle, regardless of fuel type, as I expressed in my TEDx talk, because they make public education possible. I am now more worried about ICE’s impacts on children, including scaring them away from school, than I am about fuel types of buses. That said, electric is the healthiest propulsion system, and there are things we can all do to mitigate ICE’s impacts on kids.
I’m Alison Wiley here in Oregon, a partner in MOVER, the vehicle to building (V2B) project for community resilience in Hood River, Oregon. I’ve worked in low-carbon transportation since 2006, and I founded this Electric School Bus Newsletter in 2019 (archives here). I’ve been delighted to moderate ESB panels (ok, I’m an extrovert) at the STN West conference and the Green Transportation Summit and Expo. I’ve done contracted ESB projects for the World Resources Institute’s Electric School Bus Initiative, Beaverton School District, Pacific Power, Portland General Electric and more. My former employers include Center for Transportation and the Environment, Forth Mobility and the Oregon Department of Transportation’s Public Transit Division.
EPA’s Clean School Bus Program 2.0
The EPA has scrapped the last round of CSBP rebate applications, the ones submitted January 2025, issuing no awards. It indicates it will do a new funding round within 2026, featuring more oversight, probably grants rather than rebates, and reimbursement-only, with no funds issued up front, unlike some prior rounds. Reimbursement-only means many low-income districts will not be able to participate, because they don’t have cash on hand. Those are the districts the five billion dollar CSBP was particularly designed to assist. Two billion remain in the CSBP, with about one billion having been distributed in each of two rebate rounds and one grant round.
The above is from the text of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill of 2021 (bipartisan initiatives are great, and this one ties in with my belief ESBs may be inherently purple). Find registration for the March 3rd webinar and CSBP events in general here.
The EPA is opening the CSBP to fossil fueled buses, and in fact about 5% of the three billion the program has awarded to date has been spent on propane (fossil fueled) buses, with the other 95% going to electric buses, which reflects the fuel type that districts requested in their applications. Lots of districts do run propane buses, though only one manufacturer, Blue Bird, makes them any more. But the EPA is specifically stating that fuels like liquified natural gas (LNG) and hydrogen will be eligible. None of those are currently in production (STN), or have ever been in production. They’ve never existed at all, presumably because they’re not economically viable to manufacturers, or desired by school districts.
So I guess EPA’s request to the public to provide information to them on school buses seems like a really good idea.
ICE Impacts and Mutual Aid
A prominent transportation director, in a large district in a large state, states they’ve had ICE abduct families in their district, but has been forbidden to talk to the press about it because the school board fears loss of federal funding. The director insists on anonymity for the same reason. Families keep children home from school when they’re frightened. All this fear means data on ICE related student absenteeism can’t be amassed, though anecdotes can be collected, and should be.
Bus drivers and teachers often don’t know a child’s or family’s documentation status, and they shouldn’t need to know, because the 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Plyer v. Doe indicated “every child has the right to go to public school free of charge from kindergarten through 12th grade regardless of status.” Millions of children are in mixed-status families in which they are citizens, and their parents are not. You can’t discern immigration status by looking at people; plenty of dark-skinned people are documented or already citizens, while many light-skinned people aren’t.
Broward Schools in Florida (STN) has a policy in which bus drivers don’t surrender children to ICE agents should they appear, but instead contacts the district’s legal counsel. At least one large Oregon district has a similar policy. Immigrant protections vary widely by state.
Mutual aid to families at schools targeted by ICE has become a common response. This can look like adults patrolling school areas or bus stops before first bell times and when school lets out, equipped with whistles and phone cameras if they see ICE. Know-your-rights trainings are popular and valuable. My neighbors and I are involved in another form of mutual aid. We bring groceries and other supplies to a lead neighbor who delivers a carful of them to a school that even she doesn’t know the name of until the last minute.The need for secrecy in feeding children is far and away the worst news in this newsletter. So, let’s note something:
Giving food and other humanitarian aid to undocumented immigrants is lawful and protected, a quick Google search advises us. Word of mouth is the primary way that mutual aid gets organized. Talk with other people who care about kids, whether in your school, workplace, neighborhood or place of worship, to find a path of contributing. We, and vulnerable children, don’t have to be helpless here.
Craig Beaver Retiring June 30, 2026
Craig Beaver, Administrator of Transportation at Beaverton School District (BSD) in Oregon, is soon retiring, and I am in mourning over this, as I have freely shared with many of you, including Craig. “You’re gonna get over it real soon,” Craig cheerfully told me. He and I have collaborated on ESB conference panels, the grant-writing that landed his district a 20 million dollar ESB grant from the CSBP, and more. He was named School Transportation News Director of the Year in 2024, for reasons including his building what will soon be the third largest ESB fleet in the nation. BSD intends to post his job on this site sometime in March.
It is good news that Craig served BSD’s fleet, and shared his ESB leadership with Oregon, the Pacific Northwest and beyond, for as long as he did. It’s not bad news, exactly, that he’s retiring. We just need someone great to succeed him.
Alison Wiley (she/her/hers)
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To go fast, go alone. To go far, go together. — African proverb