A parent in the Northern Lehigh School District has once again taken the school board to task about his child not being able to board a bus and instead having to walk to school.

Resident Joshua Pitten told the school board on Monday that he watched the school board committee meeting from last week in which it was proposed to do a Pennsylvania Department of Transportation study.

Pitten asked where the situation stood, to which Assistant Superintendent Dr. Tania Stoker explained to Pitten where the school board was at in the process.

“We don’t at this point, we’re still doing fact-finding,” Stoker said. “We expect to be able to bring that back to the committee meeting in March.”

Pitten mentioned that he brought the matter to the board’s attention back in September because his daughter is in the middle school and she has to walk 1.9 miles.

Pitten said (board President Mathias Green) keeps bringing up $400,000, “which is just a fake number.”

“Half of the buses are empty, not empty, but they’re not full,” he said. “Do you really feel, Mr. Green, that my daughter should be walking to school from Walnutport 1.9 miles away in this weather?”

Green said he wasn’t sure if that was his decision to make.

“All I can say from my perspective is students even from my class, way back when, have been walking from Walnutport the 2 miles; we’re taking a look at it,” Green said. “I don’t believe personally that this board is willing to commit $400,000.”

Pitten stressed it’s not $400,000, and that it’s a fake number that Green keeps bringing up over and over again.

Green asked Pitten if he heard the conversation from the bus people at the committee meeting.

“But you’re also having buses go half empty that go right past my daughter’s residence,” Pitten said.

Green said when they assign buses, they assign a certain number of students to that bus.

“You cannot then just put other students on that bus who are not assigned, it doesn’t work that way,” Green said. “If you allowed that to happen, could you imagine the calamity that could occur, you don’t know who’s on what bus and where they are.”

Pitten said they could set it up so that his daughter could get on the bus every day.

However, Green said the bus is already full.

Pitten countered that it’s not.

“I will take a picture tomorrow,” Pitten said. “It is not full.”

Green noted that Pitten was talking riding, whereas he was talking assigned seats, which he said are two different things.

“We’re looking at doing the study,” Green said. “We have not made a decision on that; the board has not taken a vote on doing a study at this point in time.”

Pitten asked when that will happen.

Green said that would possibly happen at the March committee meeting.

In September, the school board chose not to pursue a recommendation to hire additional crossing guards for intersections along Main Street in Slatington and Walnutport.

Superintendent Dr. Matthew J. Link told the school board at that time that some parents in Walnutport were concerned about their children walking to school.

At that time, Link recommended that the board approved the hiring of four crossing guards to serve at designated intersections along Main Street in both Slatington and Walnutport.

Link said that with those crossing guards in place, the district would provide increased supervisors along a main walking route for its secondary students who live 2 miles or less from the school and therefore ineligible to be roistered on buses.

The crossing guards would have assisted students at Main and Dowell streets near Turkey Hill in Slatington; Main and Center streets near Bechtel’s Pharmacy in Slatington; Main and North Walnut/Route 873 near ID Wraps in Slatington; and Main and Canal streets in Walnutport.

Pitten addressed the board at that time about concerns with the current bus protocol.

Furthermore, Pitten questioned at that time how does a crossing guard in Slatington help his daughter cross railroad tracks, the Lehigh River and the Canal.

Pitten also asked board members if they could imagine walking to school if it were dark, 35 degrees and raining.

Hearing no direction to move forward at that time, the board moved on.