NASHVILLE – Now that he’s signed his own regulatory-based answer to last year’s Hamilton County school bus crash into law, Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam says he will explore whether Rep. JoAnne Favors’ approach calling for mandatory seat belts on buses is “the right thing to do.”
“We’re going to continue to do work to say, ‘Are they the right answer today?'” the governor said last week to reporters. “And if they are, then we’ll figure out the financial piece. But as you know, there’s quite a bit of disagreement about whether seat belts were the right thing to do just from a safety standpoint.”
Haslam said the administration will study what other states have done on the issue.
Favors, a Chattanooga Democrat, said she’s “very pleased that the governor is still expressing interest.”
As amended, her House bill would have required all new public and private school buses come equipped with seat belts starting July 1, 2019. Sen. Todd Gardenhire, R-Chattanooga, sponsored the Senate version of the bill.