Every school day, drivers illegally pass stopped school buses while kids are getting on or off, and most of the time nobody’s there to catch it. HB 7 gives school districts a tool to catch it anyway.
The bill allows school districts to install camera monitoring systems on school bus stop arms to record vehicles that illegally pass a stopped bus, with a civil penalty enforced against the vehicle’s owner. Recorded images can only be used to enforce that specific violation, nothing else, a limit the Senate added before final passage. The bill also requires clear notice of a citation, sets up a formal process for contesting one, and allows a vehicle registration to be suspended if a penalty goes unpaid, though registration holds have to be lifted within one business day of payment. Separately, it closes a real gap in traffic law: drivers on the opposite side of an undivided road now have to stop for a school or church bus too, not just drivers approaching from behind, and it raises the maximum fine for illegally passing a stopped bus.
School districts already own the school zones, the crossing guards, and the buses themselves. This bill gives them one more tool to make sure a child getting off the bus makes it home safely.
HB 7 was sponsored by Rep. David Hale. It passed the House 78-15, the Senate 37-1 with a committee substitute, and received final House concurrence 79-11.