N.Y. Education Law § 3623: School buses

§ 3623. School buses. 1. a. The commissioner of transportation in

consultation with the commissioner shall adopt, promulgate and enforce

rules, standards and specifications regulating and controlling the

efficiency and equipment of school buses used to transport pupils, with

particular regard to the safety and convenience of such pupils and the

suitability and adaptability of such school buses to the requirements of

the school district. No school bus shall be purchased by a school

district or used for the transportation of pupils unless and until it

has been approved by the commissioner of transportation as complying

with the rules, standards and specifications relating thereto.

b. No bus manufactured after January first, nineteen hundred

seventy-four shall be used to transport pupils under any contract with a

school district or board of cooperative educational services unless it

has been similarly approved by the commissioner of transportation,

except that no such approval shall be required for buses used to

transport pupils and also used to serve the general public under a

certificate of public convenience for the operation of a bus line,

granted pursuant to the transportation law or for buses used to

transport pupils, teachers and other persons acting in a supervisory

capacity to and from school activities and which bus does not receive or

discharge passengers on or along the public highways on regularly

scheduled routes and is operating under a permit as a contract carrier

of passengers granted pursuant to the transportation law or by the

interstate commerce commission. School buses manufactured or assembled

prior to April first, nineteen hundred seventy-seven may not be used to

transport pupils, teachers and other persons acting in a supervisory

capacity to and from school activities.

c. The commissioner shall establish and provide for the enforcement of

rules and regulations requiring instruction on the use of seat safety

belts as specified in subdivision five of section three hundred

eighty-three of the vehicle and traffic law and section thirty-six

hundred thirty-five-a of this chapter, drills in safe boarding and

exiting procedures and emergency drills to be conducted on all school

buses and shall emphasize specific hazards encountered by children

during snow, ice, rain and other inclement weather. All such drills

shall include instruction in the importance of orderly conduct by all

school bus passengers. A minimum of three such drills shall be had on

each school bus during the school year, the first to be conducted during

the first seven days of session of the fall term.

2. The commissioner shall, after public hearing, promulgate rules and

regulations requiring drills on school buses for those pupils who do not

participate in such drills required by subdivision one of this section,

and the commissioner may provide by such rules and regulations for

instructional alternatives to carry out the purposes of this

subdivision.