II 109th CONGRESS 2d Session S. 3756 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES July 27 (legislative day, July 26), 2006 Mr. Menendez introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Environment and Public Works A BILL To study and improve the air quality inside school buses, and for other purposes.

1.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the Healthy School Bus Act of 2006.

2.

Findings

Congress finds that— (1)although air pollution is a health hazard for people of all ages, children are potentially more vulnerable because the lungs of children are still developing and children breathe 50 percent more air per pound of body weight than adults; (2)diesel exhaust is considered to be a probable human carcinogen by the Environmental Protection Agency and the World Health Organization and contains a high concentration of fine particles and 40 compounds that are listed as hazardous air pollutants by the California Environmental Protection Agency; (3)fine particles from diesel exhaust have been implicated as a potential cause of heart disease, respiratory disease, and stroke; (4)diesel exhaust aggravates asthma, a disease that affects approximately 4,500,000 American children in kindergarten through twelfth grade; (5)nearly 24,000,000 children in the United States spend an average of an hour and a half each day in a school bus; (6)because of the protection school buses provide in the event of a crash, school buses are the safest way for children to travel to school; (7)the Clean School Bus USA program of the Environmental Protection Agency, designed to help school districts replace aging bus fleets or install pollution control equipment, received proposals requesting approximately $60,000,000 in grants, but could only award $10,000,000 in grants; (8)recent studies have indicated that the concentration of diesel exhaust inside a school bus can be considerably higher than in the ambient environment, and that some, if not most, of that pollution may be coming from the bus itself; and (9)although activities designed to curtail emissions from the tailpipe of school buses appear to have a positive effect on the air quality inside the bus cabin, it is not clear how pollution enters the cabin or what the best strategies are for combating the pollution.

3.

Study of air quality inside school buses

(a)

Study

Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency shall— (1)conduct a study on air quality inside school buses; and (2)submit to Congress a report on the results of the study. (b)

Strategies

The Administrator shall— (1)develop strategies for improving air quality inside school buses; (2)conduct or support research to evaluate the effectiveness of the strategies; and (3)not later than 15 months after the date of enactment of this Act, submit to Congress a report describing the strategies and the results of the research. (c)

Authorization of appropriations

There is authorized to be appropriated to carry out this section $750,000.

4.

Authorization of appropriation for clean school bus activities

There is authorized to be appropriated to the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to carry out activities (including expansion of the Clean School Bus USA program) to reduce the quantity of air pollution emitted by school buses and to improve the air quality inside of school buses $55,000,000 for fiscal year 2006 and each subsequent fiscal year.

5.

Sense of Congress

It is the sense of Congress that local educational agencies and schools should— (1)assign less-polluting buses to the longest school bus routes; and (2)adopt and implement policies to decrease school bus idling.