NASHVILLE - A state House panel today voted to send a bill requiring Tennessee school buses be equipped with safety belts by July 1, 2023, on to the full Transportation Committee after hearing dramatic testimony from two Children's Hospital at Erlanger physicians on duty when a Woodmore Elementary School bus crashed last year, killing six children.
Dr. Alan Khort, a pediatrician and chief medical officer, and David Bhattacharya, a pediatric surgeon, testified that three-point safety belts could have benefited some of the survivors who suffered head injuries and broken bones.
Rep. JoAnne Favors, D-Chattanooga, who is sponsoring the bill to require seat belts, said afterwards she was happy to see the bill move.
But Favors noted she will need to address a massive fiscal note that estimates it would cost the state and local school districts more than $400 million to buy new buses to meet the 2023 implementation date.
Favors said she is looking at trying to resolve the panel's concerns by looking at a longer implementation timeline.
Sitting in the audience watching were several children who survived the Nov. 21 crash on Talley Road in the Brainerd section of Chattanooga, as well as their parents.
Parents said they believe seat belts would have helped prevent some of the injuries when the bus turned over.
Lawmakers and the Tennessee School Board Association have raised concerns about the costs and some have questioned whether seat belts would have helped, arguing that buses' compartmentalized seat construction is designed to protect occupants.
But Bhattacharya told the subcommittee that three-point seat belts would have helped, noting some children's arm bones were broken, indicating they had put their hands out in an effort to protect themselves as they were thrust toward the seat in front of them.
He said in one case, a child suffered severe chest trauma as a result of slamming into the next seat.
Khort noted that the National Transportation Safety Board and the head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration have now recommended the three-point safety belts.
The Hamilton County Grand Jury this month indicted Johnthony Walker on six counts of vehicular homicide, four counts of reckless aggravated assault and one count each of reckless endangerment and reckless driving.
Police have said Walker was speeding was spending in the bus, which carried the 37 elementary students, when the bus left a curvy road, struck a utility pole, overturned and slammed into a tree.