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<p>WRIGHT TWP. &#8212; One parent called Crestwood&#8217;s new transportation schedules &#8220;unethical.&#8221; A father called the list of bus pick-up times &#8220;cumbersome and unclear.&#8221; And a mother told Crestwood School District officials &#8220;it&#8217;s way to late in the game&#8221; to seek feedback on the schedules when the first day of school is Monday.</p><p>But perhaps one of the biggest issues, revealed through later research, was the revelation that one of the recently announced bus stops coincides with the home of a Megan&#8217;s Law registered sex offender.</p><p>That issue came to late Thursday afternoon. One of the buses, Crestwood AM No. 2, is scheduled to make stops in front of 178 Church Road, Wright Township. The issue, though, is that address belongs to Robert Kemler, who was convicted in November 2006 for charges of rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, incest and aggravated indecent assault.</p><p>Records show that he committed the deviate acts between 1995 and 1998.</p><p>District solicitor Jack Dean, during a phone call with a Times Leader reporter Thursday evening, said he wasn&#8217;t aware of the issue, but said that it would be an easy one to fix.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll move the bus stop,&#8221; he said, once the district confirms the bus stop is assigned to Kemler&#8217;s home.</p><p>School board Vice President James Costello was not immediately available for comment Thursday evening.</p><p>Nearly three dozen parents crowded the high school library at the start of an 8 a.m. special School Board meeting, eager to raise pointed questions about schedule changes some said will force their children to board a bus at 6:30 a.m. for 8 a.m. classes at a school only a few miles away.</p><p>Their concerns centered mostly on new routes for students who don&#8217;t even attend a district school. Most had children enrolled at St. Jude&#8217;s, a Diocese of Scranton elementary only 1.3 miles from the district high school. Yet one after another complained their children would now be on a bus with high school students, boarding an hour or more before St. Jude opens its doors, traveling much farther than the actual distance between home and school</p><p>While some spoke with palpable anger, Lauren Lont made her point quietly by bringing her two children &#8212; 7-year-old Autumn and 5-year-old Richie &#8212; in front of the board. She pointed out they had gotten so restless waiting for her to get a chance to speak they took off their shoes and now stood barefoot. She noted &#8220;my son has gone to the bathroom three times just since we got here.&#8221; And she asked how the board expects her children to patiently ride a bus so early, with high school students, without becoming anxious.</p><p>Parents tried to voice their concerns during the special meeting, which lasted only a few minutes, but were told by solicitor Jack Dean they could only comment on the agenda items. Several began shouting until Board Vice President James Costello &#8212;presiding because president Bill Jones was out of state &#8212; said he and others would stay after the meeting.</p><p>Costello stayed with board Members Barry Boone, Anna Bibla and William Thomas, as well as acting Superintendent Joseph Rasmus and incoming Superintendent Bob Mehalick. Costello said other board members wanted to stay but the law barred a quorum (five or more) from gathering without holding an advertised meeting.</p><p>The issue centered on two big changes by the district this summer: Replacement of long-time transportation contractor Rinehimer Bus Lines with G. Davis, and implementation of new Transfinder school bus routing software. Rasmus said the district took the opportunity to make a &#8220;deep dive&#8221; into a transportation system that had been largely unchanged for decades.</p><p>That &#8220;deep dive&#8221; resulted in extensive revamping of bus routes, with nine routes eliminated and the average occupancy of each bus rising from 50 percent to 70 percent. It also could save the district up to $400,000, because the base contract with G. Davis is that much lower than the base contract with Rinehimer was.</p><p>But one audience member alleged the changes were made to maximize state reimbursement for transportation costs &#8212; which hinges on numerous factors including number of students in a bus &#8212; without regard to the impact on the young children.</p><p>Costello said that for years, students being transported to other nonpublic schools had been riding with high school students, and that the new routes simply extended that policy to those going to St. Jude. Parents countered that the other nonpublic schools are well outside the district &#8212; as far as Wilkes-Barre, Freeland and Forty Fort, while St. Jude is in the district.</p><p>If school districts transport their own students, state law requires them to transport residents to any nonpublic school within 10 miles of district boundaries.</p><p>&#8220;You are lumping students attending school right here on the mountain with those who go down into the valley,&#8221; one said.</p><p>By 11 a.m. the crowd had thinned to eight parents, and Rasmus, Costello and Mehalick all promised to revisit the schedules and adjust them as much as possible, both immediately and throughout the year, to accommodate the many concerns about safety and early pickup times. Rasmus said the process will remain fluid out of necessity because it is new and information keeps coming in from parents. While he promised to notify parents of any changes before Monday, he also cautioned it could take up to a month to work most of the bugs out of the new system.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Lauren Lont voices concerns about how the new Crestwood bus schedule will impact her children Autumn, 7, and Richie, 3, during a lengthy session with four school board members after a special meeting Thursday morning. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/web1_Crestwood-bus-2.jpg</photo0><caption0>Lauren Lont voices concerns about how the new Crestwood bus schedule will impact her children Autumn, 7, and Richie, 3, during a lengthy session with four school board members after a special meeting Thursday morning. </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Mark Guydish</p><p>mguydish@www.timesleader.com</p><p>By Patrick Kernan</p><p>pkernan@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Mark Guydish at 570-991-6112 or on Twitter @TLMarkGuydish</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Parents decry Crestwood bus schedule during 3-hour session after board meeting