ANNAPOLIS — Del. Deni Taveras wants the state to require that some new school buses have lap and shoulder seat belts, a fight she’s been waging for years.
“I want to be able to create a situation where people feel more comfortable because there’s increased discipline, there’s increased safety, there is the less likelihood of, in case of turnovers, that these children are not paralyzed or are killed,” said Taveras, D-Prince George’s.
Taveras has introduced legislation to add seat belts since 2024. This year’s version would require large Maryland school buses purchased after July 1, 2030, to have three-point seat belts, which go across a passenger’s lap and shoulders.
It also requires instruction on the proper use of seat belts and prevents civil actions against bus drivers if they don’t ensure that a student is buckled.
The House Environment and Transportation Committee held a hearing on the bill in February, but it has not moved forward. Its chances of passage are slim. Crossover Day — the date when each chamber sends bills it passed to the other chamber — was on Monday.
“It’s just passing the buck down to somebody else,” Taveras said. “I don’t think that that’s good policy.”
The bill follows the recommendation of the National Transportation Safety Board, which advises Maryland and other states to require all new large school buses be equipped with lap and shoulder seat belts.
The agency said three-point seat belts provide the highest level of protection during a crash, including a rollover.
“We could lose a life, God forbid,” Taveras said.
Opponents of the legislation argue the design of larger school buses is safe because it can distribute the force of the crash and students are surrounded by tall, padded seats that can cushion and contain them during a crash.
They also worry about the cost. The bill does not allocate funding for seat belts. Instead, it passes the cost to local school systems, which would have to spend about $4.3 million each year for 12 years, according to the bill’s fiscal and policy note.
The bill would “impose a significant fiscal burden and constraints on local decision-making due to a statewide mandate,” the Maryland Association of Boards of Education said in written testimony to the House Environment and Transportation Committee on Feb. 5.
The association also cautioned that younger students may need help buckling and unbuckling their seatbelts, which could cause delays.
In 2025, there were 1,927 crashes in Maryland that involved school buses, according to data from the Maryland Department of State Police. That’s about 1.9% of total crashes recorded that year and down from 1,976 crashes in 2024.
California became one of the first states to require new school buses to have three-point seat belts in 2004.
There has been a 74.5% decrease in the number of school pupil passenger injuries since 2004, according to a 2026 report by Ron Kinney, a former state director of school transportation for the California Department of Education.
“Look at the number of kids that could have suffered more serious injuries but did not because of not just the lap belts, but also the enforcement of use and all the other things that go with it,” Kinney said.