With the new school year underway, Montana Highway Patrol troopers are stepping up enforcement around school bus stops and asking drivers across the Helena area to remember the law: when the red lights flash, you stop.
Helena Public Schools bus driver Dena — whose full last name was not released in initial reports — put it plainly this week. "We are transporting kids; they are the most valuable thing in this world," she said. It's the kind of statement that sounds obvious until you watch a car blow past a bus on a residential street with a child stepping off the bottom stair.
Under Montana law, drivers traveling in both directions on an undivided road must stop when a school bus activates its lights and extends its stop arm. Violations carry fines and can result in license suspension. Troopers say the first weeks of a new school year are historically when the most close calls occur, as drivers readjust to earlier morning traffic and new bus routes that may not have existed the previous spring.
Parents dropping off or picking up students at Helena's schools are also reminded that school zone speed limits are strictly enforced during arrival and dismissal hours. If you're running late and tempted to push it — don't. The kids crossing in front of you are someone's whole world.