001The time is now 3:33 p.m. Good afternoon and welcome to the May 13th, 2026 electric school bus and bus lot modernization focus workgroup meeting. I am Pamela Boozer-Strother, committee co-chair and District 3 Board of Education member. It brings me great pleasure to welcome everyone to today's meeting. I am joined by my co-chair, board member Amy Alibo of District 4. For those unable to observe now, the meeting is being recorded and can be accessed on the PGCPS YouTube channel for later viewing. The agenda and documents can be found on the PGCPS diligent page linked from the Board of Education homepage. I thank all of you for committing to this important oversight and partnership work. Agenda item 2.0 roll call. Ms. McMillan, please call the roll. Ah. Give me a minute. Pamela Boozer-Strother. Present. Amy Alibo. Present.
002Dorothy Morrison. Present. Cynthia Escobar. Kate Robb. Present. Ramon Palencia Calvo. Sean Matlock. Kiba Baldwin. Present. Sheila Stevens. Present. Seth Finson. Present. There are seven members present. Thank you so much. We have a quorum. So, in addition to our committee members, we welcome special guest presenters. For the national landscape discussion, we have Brittany Barrett, deputy director implementation and operations at World Resources Institute. Tish Tablan, senior program director at Generation 180, and Sara Stockcup Jones, project uh lead project manager electric uh for electric school buses at Calstart. For the state of Maryland discussion, we welcome Nally Bechemi, Maryland Energy Administration transportation program manager and director of the Maryland Clean Cities and Communities Coalition, and Timothy Shepherd, Maryland Department of the Environment deputy program manager. For the school district case study discussion, we welcome Anthony Ashley, senior director
003fleet services for the Atlanta public school system. And he may uh be joined later by Adam Johnson, the senior executive director, or Candace Phillips, the director of operations and business administration. 3.0 presentations. There are three items for discussion this afternoon. After each item, we will limit each each member's questions and feedbacks to 2.5 minutes per round. And we will start with 3.1, the national landscape for electric school bus and charging infrastructure implementation and funding. And the chair recognizes Britney Barrett, Tish Tablan, and Sara Stockcup Jones. Thank you all so much. Thank you so much for having me. Um and Sara Tish and Sara joining as well. Um they, you know, have a lot of background and knowledge about what's going on with electric school buses. Uh so, you've got a a good team here. Um
004I have a relatively short presentation. Um wanting to leave enough time for the questions and discussion. Um and just want to be as helpful as possible. I don't think Tish or Sara are planning on any particular presentation, but also could add. Um all of you feel free to jump in while I'm speaking. Um I do have a few slides uh to share if I can I'm sorry, I'm used to Teams meetings, so let me see if I can do this. Yeah, we can see the slides. Okay, just the slides. Mhm. Okay, great. I can never know with presenter view that that what it's showing, so great. Um thank you so much again for having me. Um uh very excited to be uh speaking with you today, presenting a little bit of information about the national
005landscape, uh what's going on with electric school buses. Um I actually mentioned this the other day that uh Kiba was the very first transportation director I met when I officially started my role at WRI, and this is before he came to Prince George's County. So, I feel very uh come full circle 5 years later uh working uh with him again. So, um I uh titled this uh from commitment to implementation, the messy middle. Um and I thought that was uh appropriate for um the discussion today. So, just wanted to start a bit with um some highlights and numbers. Uh currently, there are almost 14,000 electric school buses committed, procured, delivered, or in operation as of July 2025. Um we actually maintain um a database of all of these school buses that fit one of these
006categories, procured, delivered, operation, um on our website that we update every 2 months. Uh so, if you would like even newer numbers, feel free to to visit that. Um those buses have gone to 15 about 1,500 districts and private fleet operators. 36% are in school districts with the highest share of low-income households. All but Wyoming. All states but Wyoming have an electric school bus now. We're very close to getting one in Wyoming. They have been working on it for a while. Um and 60% of electric school bus commitments are in non-urban areas, um which includes suburban, town, rural, and city. Um so, with that kind of broad overview, I I wanted to tie, you know, what's going on nationally back to local community. I don't know if I mentioned that I'm actually based in Charlottesville,
007Virginia, so not too far away. Um I took the opportunity to read through your climate action plan to refresh my memory uh before giving the presentation. Um and you have a a great robust plan that kind of wraps around um a lot of different pieces. Um you have the low-carbon transportation commitment, uh facilities modernization, uh resilience hubs, and equity. And ESBs fit in >> [clears throat] >> with all of those uh components of your action plan. Um and the commitment timeline that's also specified in there, I think is is great. Uh we do see a lot of districts setting goals um between, you know, 2030 um and, you know, out to 2040, 2045 as well for the transition. So, um uh That's uh you're right in line with what's going on nationally. Um and uh
008just want you to know that as well. Um so, uh it's great to have that commitment, um but then the implementation is where things uh slip where the rubber hits the road, as I say. Um, this is just a a a map a road map of how uh I mean we have divided the electric school bus implementation um into phases. Now, this looks very organized and orderly in steps one through five, but it's actually quite messy. Many of these things are happening concurrently um and different pieces um can be um pivotal moments for being able to move forward, as I'm sure uh Akiva can attest to. Uh the infrastructure piece can be one of the most challenging pieces, and that's uh what I think we hear the most from districts who are in this kind
009of messy middle uh with their implementation. Um, we see very frequently that buses arrive before the charging infrastructure um has been put in. That has a lot to do with the funding programs that they were, you know, clean school bus program put money out that covered the bus and not the infrastructure. School districts were able to get that money and get their buses ordered and then began the process of planning, oh, how do we get our facilities ready? Um, so it is not unique um to to your district just to have the buses before the infrastructure. Utility coordination overall is the number one um concern that we hear from school districts across the US. Um, transportation directors haven't historically been involved with their electric electric utility. Fueling is done either by a third party offsite
010uh or any number of other ways that aren't uh don't require a robust plan and that impact the operations. There is funding uncertainty. The clean school bus program funds are still available um at the federal level. Uh, EPA had just finished a, um, an RFI process gathering comments and feedback on the program. Uh, and we are hearing maybe late June that an announcement will be made for the next round of funding to come out. Um, but we've had quite a long time without any funding flowing. So, I know that's caused a lot of uncertainty for districts who, you know, started down the path and then weren't sure what was going on. Um, also, you know, clean heavy-duty vehicle grants, some were pulled back, uh, as well. So, that that's caused, um, a lot of issues.
011Um, and then throughout all of this, you still need to get kids to school safely, and you still need to replace buses, um, and you need to do that now. So, many school districts are considering alternative fuels and paths. So, I want to touch a little bit on that, uh, as well. Um, so, these are just some of the very high-level things that we hear from districts. I'm happy to answer, you know, any specific questions you may have. Um, we have lots of case studies on our website about, um, particular districts, uh, and their challenges that have similar climates, geographies, service areas, um, mileage on their routes to, uh, what PG&E has. Um, what I think the overarching theme of this, though, is electrification is not just a transportation project, and I think you all
012see that. Um, it's it's a holistic facilities, energy, and operations transformation. Um, and having that just on the transportation director who's also trying to get kids to school safely every day, that's a lot. That's That's a whole other full-time job. Like, people, I'm trying to get some more help for you here, so. >> [laughter] >> Um, so, you know, it it it is holistic and but I think this also ties in directly with your uh climate action plan. I'll kind of go a little bit deeper into that um in a couple of slides, but um the uh many school districts use bus electrification as an opportunity to modernize their facilities as well. So, upgrading that. I've worked with um Dallas School District, LA, Boston are several very large districts that thousand uh plus buses. Um,
013New York as well that are holistically looking at how transportation um can impact um the the buildings, the infrastructure, um and the climate goals uh that the school district may have. Um, so, I tried to um synthesize some of the key lessons learned that we've seen through all of these case studies, school districts that we've spoken with. Um, lesson number one, utilities can determine timelines. And I think um that we hear that over and over again. We always encourage school districts to go talk to their utility first um before they even think about ordering a bus to figure out um you know, some of the the basics that need to happen. Um, and also the depot readiness matters more than the the bus procurement. So, and I think you've seen this also in that there's
014a lot Transportation facilities are not historically something that districts have invested a lot in because you're paying teachers and trying to do educational programs. So, as long as kids are getting to school safely, you know, that's been the minimum that's needed. Um, so, there's many many districts who have aging facilities that need to be upgraded. Um, phased deployments work better. Um, as you know, lessons learned through the technology, new um versions of buses being brought, new battery capacity, new chargers, charge management software, energy and demand management, and V2G vehicle-to-grid benefits. Everything is still in development coming out. So, taking small steps while you can seems to be the theme that we've seen is start with a few and learn and grow from there. Um and then internal coordination is critical. We need typically we used
015to run workshops with school districts to set up the plan for you know receiving buses. We've done them in same school districts that I mentioned earlier. Um and there was a lot of surprise about don't forget to invite your IT person, your facilities person, your finance and procurement people. Um really you need you need a team. Um this is just like a facility but new build a new school being built. Like it involves every aspect of school system and I think that is sometimes a new new challenge for the transportation department that hasn't necessarily been involved with all of this historically. Um so, you know, with that being said I want to again bring it back to what I has been shared with me about your specific context. Um that you know, you have buses
016coming, you have a plan and a goal, but the funding's not necessarily coming as quickly as we would like and you but you've still got to replace buses. So, we you are not the only one that we see in this kind of a situation and school districts start discussing bridge solutions. How do we get ourselves um from here to where our goal is given our operational realities. Um, service matters for sure. We I completely understand that. Um, but nationally we are seeing interim strategies that become can become permanent if districts aren't intentional. Um, you know, we see interim solutions whether that's more diesel buses, propane, or mobile charging uh not as a strategy but as a way to maintain operations while the infrastructure catches up. Um, so I use this image of is it a
017bridge or is it an anchor? And I think that's a really important distinction in how you treat that. Um, it's definitely you need buses that that work um like it get kids to school safely um and you you need a something to give yourself time while you build out the infrastructure and you know, keep confidence with your stakeholders, the community um and and everyone that you are still moving towards your goals. The problem comes when that interim solution becomes a long-term substitute for what the original goal was. Um, if it diverts capital, people, energy, resources, time uh away from what the intended plan was, um and >> [clears throat] >> you know, that again then it starts to push out what the original goal was longer and longer. Um, so you know, I know with
018the clean school bus program request for information there was a lot of uh details about alternative fuels and the number one being propane. There's no uh there's no CNG offerings or hydrogen offerings for electric school school buses currently even though they did ask about those fuels. Um, so propane seems to be the one that keeps coming uh back up with different schools districts and exploring, you know, well, it seems to be just as green or very very close. It's a great alternative. That is what I hear a lot. Um, so I do you know, want to acknowledge that it it does have low greenhouse gas emissions. Um, still not as low as electric. But some things to keep in mind. There is only one OEM that makes a propane bus, that's Bluebird. So, if you
019do pursue that as a brave strategy, just know you are locked in to a single provider. Um, there are still facility upgrades that are required for um, the tanks used. There's still new training for mechanics and operators that needs to be done. Um, and it doesn't actually provide any additional benefits for resilience, which is those other parts of your plan in terms of your in your facilities and infrastructure. Um, and I chart here, um, just going over propane emissions, um, even looking at the life cycle in every single region in the US, uh, electric is still lower um, than propane overall. What what I think is m- maybe more important um, to you and your community are the other uh, air pollutants that uh, come from propane. Um, this is from an article that we
020published recently uh, on our website uh, that delves into all of the uh, the the air pollutants. And that's what affects your kids at the tailpipe, your drivers, your mechanics. Um, uh, propane is not lower and not anywhere close on NOx, uh, uh, sulfur dioxide, uh, PMs, particulate matter, all of them they're much worse. And so, even though people say green, you know, it's it's green. Well, yes, it's lower greenhouse gas emissions, that's for climate, but for local, it's actually not better at all. It's not anywhere close to being um better than electric. So, I only say that to help make sure that we're on the same page with how uh we're interpreting that information. Um and then just going tying this back into your bigger goals that you have for your climate action plan.
021Um electric school buses are not just a fleet replacement. Uh they become a platform for resilience, for equity, workforce development, and community investment. And that's exactly how you framed this in the climate action plan. So, I went through and pulled out the categories from there and just showed how electric school buses actually check off so many boxes for you, not just on, you know, uh one particular area. There are benefits to your workforce, to your school district climate curriculum, and stuff like that could be um made available to your students. Um again, going back to uh what I mentioned with the health outcomes of children, um the local community benefits are are with electric school buses. Um and then the resilience piece of things. So, we are working with school districts across the US on
022bettering uh high risk for wildfires um and power outages, and electric school buses can provide resilience. They can keep your um cafeteria powered uh during a power outage so that your refrigerators, you know, don't go out and the food spoils. Uh if many school districts school buildings are used as um emergency shelters, and so it can power that. In addition, the potential for revenue being generated from these buses is very real. We're following pilots across the US where school districts are successfully selling energy back to the grid and making money. Five, six, seven, eight, ten thousand dollars per bus in a year is is possible. Now, that requires more upfront investment to get the kind of equipment that's needed and it's not cheap. Um but when you have the fleet size that you do, um
023it's the total cost of ownership can pencil out and make sense uh for you. So, um that that is all I have for my presentation. Happy to answer uh any questions or open the floor for Tish or Sarah to add on to anything that I shared. I'd love to jump in. Um some of the uh information that Britney shared, especially about some of the um differences between propane and electric, I think that there was a really great example of some of the limitations of propane in responses to that EPA RFI. Um I know there's not a place for us to necessarily drop links to chats, but I'm happy to follow up and share a link um First Student, uh one of the largest school bus contractors in the United States and um also a proponent
024of electrification. They're moving a lot of their fleets towards electrification. Um responded to that RFI stating that they would no longer be pursuing propane. Um they've done them in the past. They've worked with districts who have had it. They still service districts who already have it, but they're not moving forward with any new districts. Um and in that I think that their response had a lot of really good information of why they're not moving forward with it and some of those um those operational changes that you have to make to make propane work in the interim and um some estimates about infrastructure costs. So, I think that that's just a really good uh resource to consider when thinking about, you know, is this a bridge or is it an anchor? How much work are we
025going to have to put into moving to propane? Um and if that will slow down some electrification. So, happy to share that but wanted to to point that out. Um and yeah, I think Brittany had a really good overview presentation. There are barriers, but there are great folks like the WRI team. Um my team at Calstart does a lot of fleet transition planning and technical assistance as well. So, we'd be happy to try to help you guys out on that as well. But yeah. Tish, would you like to add anything before we move to questions? Mostly want to hear questions, but kind of just adding on to what Sarah said with resources or links I can share. I've been working with both Natalie and MEA and with Brittany's data team at WRI to try to
026produce an updated map and I can share that link of all the Maryland school districts and how many electric school buses are um being deployed. And that includes publicly made commitments through operational buses. So, you can also get a quick view of the landscape of who's doing what across Maryland. Um and so that can be a helpful resource to to gauge like who what other districts you might want to talk to that are having a similar similar challenges. All right, great. Yeah, we'll look forward to those additional resources. So, before we move into the presentation specifically about Maryland that I think will definitely continue to add on to our to our what we're learning here about the landscape and where how PGCPS is fitting in. I thought we would How about we spend 10 minutes
027on 10 minutes or or more as needed on questions now on national landscape and then we'll move to Maryland and because I want to make sure we have um the right amount of time to hear from from Atlanta. I'm excited for everyone to to see what Tish and I got to see in person when we were at the National School Boards Association. So I I will open open up the floor to questions. Um go ahead and put your hands up and I'll call on call on you. All right, we'll start with uh Director of Transportation Keith Baldwin. Thank you, board member Booze Struthers. Uh um Brittany, great to see you again. Um always, you know, what you spoke about this is just just a statement. It's true and accurate. Um we just spent some time
028at the STN conference in Charlotte and about the electric school bus talk. That is it. Um we everyone's talking about gap measures because of the conversations now it seems to be with your utility companies. You know, the easiest part of the whole process is buying the bus. It's building that infrastructure to what you want and I would, you know, we we have these conversations all the time about stopgap measures and what's best and and you're spot on to our conversations and what we're planning and and trying to make good wise decisions because there's several factors what we want. Ultimately, we want to make sure our students are safe uh from that standpoint, but we also want to be cost-efficient with the buses um and and how we're using them as well. So I I appreciate
029the conversation and and sharing of the presentation. Any other questions now? All right, well, you know, keep jotting them down to add it, you know, to add in to after we hear from uh Timothy Shepherd and Nalle Bishemi. Um I will save mine then since it looks like everyone's ready to to hear more. So, I will officially introduce agenda item 3.2 State of Maryland landscape for electric school bus and charging infrastructure implementation and funding. And the chair recognizes Dorothy Morrison to introduce our presenters. Thank you. Mute off. Thank you, board member Rissetto Brothers. So, um on the state side, we have two presenters. One is from the Maryland Energy Administration, as mentioned earlier, um Natalie Bishemi is a transportation program manager at the Maryland Energy Administration, where she manages um grants and we build programs
030to promote EV adoption and increase charging infrastructure in the state of Maryland. And she's also the director of the Maryland Clean Cities um and com- communities coalition director. [clears throat] And in this role, she engages with transportation stakeholders um and discuss uh the sector's challenges and successes. Um I want to add that MEA in general, this is the agency that has been working very closely with um us here at PGCPS in terms of um awarding us various um decarbonizing grant programs. So, um Natalie's obviously on the transportation side, but I just wanted to um put that out there. And we also have um Timothy Shepherd. And Timothy Shepherd is the program manager for mobile sources program at the Maryland Department of Environment, and that is within the Air and Radiation Administration, and these are the
031folks who are responsible for regulating our air quality through permitting emission sources. And uh MDE in the past has supported the school system by providing grants, I believe to date, grants for two electric school buses through the Volkswagen settlement. So with that, I will ask um Natalie to proceed with the presentation. Yes, let me get this up. Okay. Okay, can you all see my screen? Yes, okay. >> Yes. Just like Britney, I'm always making sure I have the right screen up. Um okay, well, I am so so excited to be here with you all today. Tim and I are going to talk about electric school buses in Maryland on depending on MEA and MDE. Okay, so to get into the MEA side of things first, I kind of wanted to give a little backdrop into
032the two types of programs that I manage that have to do with electric school buses. So we for fiscal 25 and 26 had a standalone electric school bus program. This program was a part of the 90 million that was provided by the Governor Moore-Miller administration for fiscal 25 and 26. Of that 90 million, we were MEA was given 17 million for electric school buses. So we had that go for two fiscal years to really spread out the funds. And then on the next slide, I'll show you kind of the outcomes from fiscal 25 so you can kind of see the numbers. But that program is now sunsetting after fiscal 26. So it is now going to be integrated into the medium-duty heavy-duty zero-emission vehicle grant program. That program has been in statute since fiscal 24
033and it is in in through fiscal 27. So to touch a little bit on about the MHD program, like I mentioned, it is in statute. Uh, it has each fiscal year it has 10 million for uh, vehicles. And this fiscal year we will have a little bit extra money, which is very exciting. Uh, supplemental uh, charging infrastructure funding. So, that's really, really great. And that is in addition to the 10 million. So, it'll be 10 million plus a few million more for chargers. Uh, and then once again, what This is one of the things that since it's in statute, there are some eligibility requirements we have to abide by. One of those is that uh, we cover 75% of the incremental cost between the ZEV and the equivalent conventional vehicle price. So, that is still
034going to be in play in fiscal 27. And that will mean that um, if some of you are familiar with the stand-alone ESB program, that program was very, very generous. I made it very, very generous for a reason. It gave 120% of the incremental cost. So, it is the definitely going to be a reduction um, in the MHD program. But we'll still have funding for buses. Um, and then like I mentioned, charging infrastructure will be available. Um, and then in terms of the eligible vehicle categories, so we historically will continue to have these two main categories, which will be on-road and off-road vehicles. And then in addition to that, we'll have electric school buses. Uh, electric school buses have always been in the MHD program, but now we're actually going to be moving it into
035its own category to really make sure we can do the proper outreach um, that we need to really bring in those types of school districts and bus contractors who want to do this type of project. Um, so that is very, very important to us. And then the next slide. So, the next slide I really wanted to showcase um, fiscal 25 successes. Uh, fiscal 26 we have not uh, publicly announced who the awards are going to be for the the ESB program. I will say this that there are five awards again that will be giving out. So, still small pool of applicants, but that's to be expected. Um so, in fiscal 25, we had five awards again. Uh the number of vehicles that will be incentivized, so the number of ESBs is 46, and then the
036number of chargers is 33, and then the Oh, my my apologies. I meant to hit something else. Um so, the lifetime GHG emissions from this is going to be almost 8,500. That is something that we really like to see. Oh, no, my I'm so sorry, my presentation went away. One sec. There we go. Sorry. Too many screens. Um so, that is a metric that I really like to show in these types of presentations because that is one metric that we really like to see in our programs at MEA. And so, just showcasing that. Um and then the number of funds, so like I mentioned, this program was given 17 million in a fiscal 25, uh we gave a little over 9.1. Uh there were a few additional awards that ended up canceling out, so that's
037why this uh is a little bit lower than it might have been when it was first publicly announced. Okay, let's There we go. Okay, so this is what Tish was mentioning. Um and I this one is from October 2025, so it it may not It's not too too up-to-date, but this is the one that I found. Um I really wanted to showcase this just so you all can see. Um I know we got WRI's perspective from you know, this is the country, but this is for Maryland alone. Um so, this is really really great things to see. Um obviously, we still have a lot of work to do. There are some counties who um are in different situation, and that really is because some school districts are completely owned and operated by bus contractors. And
038so that is um not necessarily a barrier, but it's a bit of a challenge. And so that's one thing I really try to work on and understand how that perspective works. Um but as you can see, we have many many across the state. Um obviously many many Montgomery County. Um but that is just to give a little visual aid. And then now I will pass it over to Tim. Thanks, Natalie. Um what I wanted to focus on is just kind of looking at some of the funding opportunities coming from the environmental side. Uh unfortunately, there's not a ton, but I do want to go over a couple and then I was going to add a little bit afterwards, too. So the the nearest one is coming up. It's our our capital fund project. It's funded
039by capital funds and then it'll provide we have about approximately $3 million in funds. And how we're going to do that is it'll provide up $350,000 per bus. Um it will not cover infrastructure. It's just a lump sum of money, so that goes towards the bus. So we're hoping that because it's a fairly generous program, the amount that you'll save on the bus you can use for infrastructure. That was not our choice, but our attorney told us that while reviewing the the way the project was funded, we could only do vehicles. So anyway, so that program we're hoping to open in June of 2026. Um we'll send something out and I'll we'll be it won't it won't be first come first served. We'll have an opening and closing and certainly review all our applications. But
040we do want to have that open fairly soon. And you know, it's a little under 10 buses. So it's a start. I I realize it's not a lot, but everything helps right now. I I think what we've been seeing in Maryland is that um there was a an initial push for these things where a lot of counties were interested and we've kind of hit a wall due to various things, be it the federal support funding, um some contract logistics going on and some of the contractors that were operating in Maryland. Just in general, we've seen a lot of the counties kind of pull back a little on their interest in pursuing this. So, we're trying to keep the momentum going a little bit and we're going to try and pursue some other avenues on that.
041Um two other potential projects we I I know it was mentioned earlier that we did fund some school bus projects under VW and we are certainly open to that again. However, our concern is um under this the federal settlement with VW, it only allows us to replace vehicles that are 2009 or older. And because because of Maryland's policy of 12-year replacement cycle, a max of 15 if you get a waiver, we really don't expect there to be many 2011 buses I mean 2009 buses out there in Maryland. But if there are, we can fund them under VW. However, if not, we will not be able to do that. I just wanted to make that everyone aware of that. But we will be opening a pot of money for VW later this year, hopefully towards the
042tail end of the summer time or early fall. Uh the other project um or possible funding uh Brittany mentioned earlier is the EPA Clean School Bus Program. Uh that has been a fairly popular program in the past. Uh has Brittany also mentioned there was an RFI on that. Uh MEA and MDE did work together to make some com- some comments on that. From what we saw of the program, it looked very similar to previous ones. The one main difference we saw, which probably isn't surprising with the current status of the administration there was more of an open shift away from electric school buses and looking at other fuels. So, again the program requires X percentage go towards electric school buses, but in the past EPA exceeded that significantly. What we saw this time is that
043EPA was trying to call that back and kind of go to the bare minimum of what they required for electric school buses and look at others. That was one of the key things that we both I was in NMEA commented on was we'd like to see the focus be pushed again towards um electric school buses. We feel that, you know, it's a key opportunity and it really does need the funding impetus for that. Um something else I wanted to mention that we're doing on in the electric school bus area is we have been working with the Department of Education and we put together a survey {slash} uh questionnaire that went out to all the schools about a month ago that will canvas them on you know where they are on electric school buses what they
044see the biggest hurdles are, what are the problems, how do they handle purchasing cycles uh just trying to gather a lot of information that will help us as a state agency better tailor our funding opportunities towards them. Uh as I said, that survey went out about a month ago and we will we should have all the responses back by the end of this month and we'll tabulate everything and put it into spreadsheets etc. Uh I'd be more than glad to share some of that information with everyone. But we're we're going to use that hopefully, like I said between our program and and what Natalie does since they get a lot more funding than we do. We're we're hoping to use that to kind of better tailor these projects to fit for the school districts. Um
045and again, I think it was referenced several times um earlier, I really recommend working with the utilities. Uh they are a key player. You really can't do a large fleet without working with your utility first. So, we do really really emphasize that. And the second reason I I want to emphasize that is a lot of our utilities, I think both BGE and Pepco offer um they have a planning program to help do the plannings for the sites. And they will there's still a cost, but it's a significantly So, I've been working with Sam DuPont at BGE to try and put together something so we can present that to the schools because I I do think it's an opportunity that um you know, as we struggle with kind of our funding options, I think we have
046to start to look at other steps we can do to keep the momentum going. And I think having the schools work to develop their electrification plans and know what they have to do prior to these buses arriving is a great step and it's a fairly low-cost step. So, I I do want to see um hopefully a lot more usage with that coming up in the next fiscal/calendar year. So, we'll be working with uh Sam on that and the other utilities. Like I think like I said, I believe Pepco does offer that as well. Um BGE definitely does. So, that's kind of where we're at right now on school buses. Um I'd be glad like Natalie said to answer any questions on anything and um thanks. Great. Thank you both so much. Um we can move
047right to questions and and we can ask questions of all presenters um up to this point, you know, around national and state of Maryland. So, I will um watch for hands and see who would like to go first. Oh, uh Britney Barrett. Thanks. I Tim, I was wondering about the requirement for the 2009 year of the placement, given that, you know, we are uh a significant number of years away from that. Most of those buses shouldn't be on the road. I know that, you know, the 2010 diesel emission standards changed things, but is there any potential to update that to make it more available for districts now? Yeah, I really wish there would, but it that was a federal part of the settlement and we we can't we can't get involved with that. It's kind
048of set in stone. Um it's kind of frustrating cuz it's it's the same with all medium heavy-duty vehicles, you know, like you said, that settlement started in 2015 and was finalized in 2017 and it was a much different landscape. Um the only possibility, and this gets very complicated, is there are possibilities to do what's called like a swap, where if you find a say an existing vehicle, say if it was in this case, say if Prince George's County found a uh a private school bus operating or or something in the state, they could use that bus to scrap and kind of trade their old school bus to that private entity and then get a new school bus, but there are parameters that EPA set up that like the school bus has to operate for the
049last several years in the state. It has to be operating currently and so forth. It is an option, but it's extremely difficult, I think, particularly on the school side. But um yeah, I I I I feel your pain on that, too. I we've asked a couple times and it's just one of those things where they're not going to reopen the settlement cuz if they reopen it, it's just a whole can of worms to do that. Uh Ramon? Thank you. And thank you for the presentations and and and also Britney, I I I heard you're over the phone I was on the phone during the beginning of the call but I do Tim you mentioned the importance of have of having fleet electrification plans as a first step to kind of set the pace and kind
050of like this is where we're going and this how much is going to take us our route assessment how much is going to cost and a timeline. I was wondering if there's any assistance from either MEA or MDE to produce those plans or is something that you guys might be considering in the future depending on what comes out of that survey that you're running with um with the school districts and also curious if there's a plan like that at MC um PGCPS. Yeah, that's a good question Ramon. I looked into it from MDE's side we don't have any other funding but I think Natalie might be in a better situation. I don't want to put Natalie on the spot but um they might have a better situation and like I said um the utilities are
051offering us at a it's going to sound like a sales pitch at a significantly reduced rate though. So it is a really and I'm not pushing the utilities but it is a good deal that if you can get into these programs it's it's a a lot less. I think it's I don't want to quote Sam. I think it was five to fifteen thousand dollars or so which still isn't nothing but in the broader scheme of things it's not bad. But um I'll I'll hand it over to Natalie but I will add again also and I think Britney mentioned it earlier a key thing on this utility side is it really can take a while to get your infrastructure set up. Um you know anywhere between a a year and a half to three years depending
052on what they have to do which you know, kind of stresses why we should really be doing that step first. We certainly don't want these vehicles to arrive and not be able to use them. So, but I'll hand it off to Natalie on the funding question as well. Yes. Yes. Um so, the >> [sighs] >> ESBs, like I mentioned, they're going to be integrated into the MHD program. Um the MHD program will have funding for the the buses and the chargers, but it will not have funding for planning like the stand-alone program did. Um and that is mainly and strictly just because it's in statute. Um so, we're kind of a little bit kind of a little bound to those those um eligibility requirements in the statute, but I would think hopefully that in fiscal
05328 since the program will be out of statute, we'll have a little bit more leniency and ability to create a program that is um just more feasible for school districts who are looking to electrify. Um but unfortunately, there will not be anything in fiscal 27 for plans. All right, thank you. Um next is Dorothy and then followed by Sarah. Uh thank you. Um I just wanted to sort of address the um the planning piece. And well, thank you Natalie for letting us know there will be no funding, but this is something that we have talked about internally. Um you know, for the most part, we have been focusing just on the orange fleet or the electric school buses, but there's also the opportunity to look at our white fleet, right? So, um you know, I
054guess preliminary we started reaching out to organizations that may have a plan. Organizations by that, I mean some state agencies like MDOT and I think um I think it's the Maryland General Services. Um So, yeah. So, we're starting to scratch the surface on that and definitely would have been helpful to have the um you know, funding to help us uh start looking at how we develop a plan cuz I I think that that's going to be really important, but we might be looking to other consultant support, and it's good to know that the utility um does offer that, so that's something we'll look into to see how cost-effective it might be for the school system. And that's about it. I think that's a really good segue to into what I was going to mention. Um
055my team um a little bit of background for those of you who aren't familiar, our name is CALSTART. We started in California like 30 years ago, but we're a national and international organization now. Um I actually live in Harrisonburg, Virginia, so I'm only like 2 hours from Maryland. Um but uh we do a lot of fleet transition planning work. Unfortunately, unless there's a program funding us, we can't do it for free, but one of the things that we actually created um last year, it actually stemmed from a conversation with Natalie, um was we created a fleet transition plan component guide. Um and I'll of course send along a link to that um after this call, but it essentially outlines like what we've seen doing our own plans and working with other groups um because there
056are quite a handful of groups who can do fleet transition planning. Um and it sort of outlines what the different components of a plan are, what we've seen have been the most valuable, so that if you guys do end up working with another consultant, that can be sort of a guide of like what should I be asking for? What should I make sure that they're including with their plan output? So, I'd be happy to to pass that along, and um a thank you to Natalie for the great idea back in the day. Wonderful, that's good to know. Thank you, Sarah. And just real quick to add, I know we don't have as much well, we don't have funding it seems right now for planning, but we are continuing looking at that. Um we were looking
057at some federal grants last year that I specifically was looking at working that would have provided funds and then they got pulled. But, you know, we can always hope that some opportunities will come up again. So, we are continually trying to look. I think we have identified this is a definite need. So, on the state side, we'll continue trying to identify possible funding mechanisms, as well. Great. All right. Thank you. I'm looking for hands before I ask my question. Anyone want to go before I go? Okay, then I'm going to jump in. So, the So, this is, I guess, part Brittany and then part Natalie and Tim. Uh Brittany, you had that very important slide around all of the uh benefits of the electric school bus and the uh revenue-producing potential and the importance around
058the grid and opportunities. And we I I was curious to hear some of those specific some of the specific infrastructure needs that should be planned into new school construction. We've been doing some of it based on the climate change action plan and Sean Matlock um is one of our experts in that. And it's clear that this is now part of school construction planning. And and and once we hear from you again about some of that, it'll be more clear. And then when I go over to Maryland and say and ask is is the Interagency on School Construction and Alex Donahue, the leader there, uh is there collaboration so that school construction is electric bus implementation construction. So, that these so we're not going over to one division for the buses and vehicle-to-grid and and another
059division for the school building. So, I hope that makes sense like around this funding and planning. So, I would just have Brittany, if you could remind us some of the things we should think about before we build a new school building to take advantage of this. Sure, I can start and I would love for Sarah and Tanisha also to jump jump in and uh from a holistic uh viewpoint there. Um so, like I mentioned, there's a lot of opportunities with the electric school buses. So, number one is, you know, what what your panel and everything is looking like. Um solar and how that interacts also would be a huge one that I would consider. Um looking at uh where these facilities are cited, especially if the district is moving towards full fleet of electrification, it
060can have significant air quality improvement benefits. Um we did a really interesting project a couple of years ago using uh aerial images and a machine learning algorithm and found where I would say 95% of all of the school districts fleet depots in the US exist. And then we overlaid that with air quality um data um and we're able to just show like what the impact of electrification has directly on the on the community. Um so, where the depots are located, the routing in which the buses are traveling through those communities, which schools are being served by the electric school buses, those are, you know, three different ways to look at your planning. So, you know, at the at the depot level, at the route level, at the school level, um also. Um but I think
061when we talk about the resilience benefits, uh knowing how to isolate loads for particular key areas like cafeterias and gymnasiums, that's much easier to do on the front end so that a bus could come and just supply power there and it doesn't get taken through the whole building. We're doing a project in Colorado with Excel Energy on this very specific uh idea of being able just to power V2V uh vehicle-to-building uh there. So, that would be uh another one that I would definitely consider. Turn it over to uh Sarah or Ratish to to jump in with any ideas. I think from a uh planning perspective, too, one of the things that we see as a very high cost factor for installing charging infrastructure is trenching. So, if you have any facilities work where you're already
062going to tear up the ground and it would make sense to put chargers there, or hey, this parking lot is on the list of one of the lots that's going to have electrification and we know that we need to redo the asphalt there, get it done at the same time because that will save you a significant amount of money. That trenching can cost um some districts we've worked with has been up to like 40% of the cost um of their charger installations. So, that can be a really good way to sort of help maximize your your funds um across the site. Um and then also anywhere that you can sort of do work ahead of time and do EV readiness, install the conduit ahead of time and stub ups. So, you know, maybe we're getting
063five buses now, but we know we're going to get 10 in the future, installing five chargers, but putting the conduit down and stub ups for the next five chargers, it prevents you from a having to re-coordinate that with your utility, drawing that conduit out, and prevents those trenching costs again as well. So, anywhere that you can sort of like maximize work being done in one space at a time can be really helpful. And then considering for the same thing any transformer upgrades, if you know that you are expanding electricity to a site and chargers are going to be coming in down the line, maybe looking at seeing if you can have that charger be or that transformer be sized to be compatible with those future chargers because otherwise you'll have another work plan where you're
064going to have to swap out a transformer for a larger size down the line. So, really trying to maximize and again it ties back into that planning aspect. If you have some plans to fall back on, you can sort of plan ahead and get some stuff done to save you money down the line. And I also just wanted to say what I have up on the screen. I hope you all can see it is the link or all the QR code to the transition plan that Sarah was mentioning. So, I'm sure it'll be shared after but if anyone wanted to scan it and look at it now, just wanted to have it up on the screen for everyone. Thanks, Natalie. And Tish, did you want to add more about the infrastructure and then then our
065Maryland team can can talk about the collaboration? Sure. Yeah, I was just I think I've been trying to I've also been trying to figure out how to better engage the interagency for school construction towards a statewide school decarbonization goals and I haven't found a lot of inroads yet to figure out you know, they don't have any a lot of levers like through what they have that like require you know, if you're spending this much money, you need to do X Y and Z standards or meet you know, some kind of electrification. There there aren't really a lot of state standards through that agency that will help you know, kind of nudge that along. But presuming you're talking about hey, uh your school district already has plans for a specific school building site, you know, to
066build a new school, that's probably not where you're hoping to put your bus chargers. Your bus chargers are probably going in a depot, right? So, I would say either think creatively as you're doing those requests for capital planning, uh can you loop in a bus depot along with school construction? Or kind of circling back to Dorothy's point about white fleet, what I see more often at, you know, a school site scale is putting, um you know, personal vehicle or white fleet kind of chargers there cuz they're smaller scale. Um schools are more likely to kind of use those uh staff more likely to use those vehicles. Um or I'm seeing more and more schools that have, um just regular EV chargers available that can be both for staff, public, um you know, white fleet, however
067you want to deploy them or make them accessible, but that is more the scale I'm used to seeing at, um a school specific site that's not a depot. And Pam, I would also add on um a few more things that came into my mind. There's a lot of modular infrastructure opportunities that we've seen uh organizations like First Student who frequently lease their depot space or might lose a contract and have to pick up and leave. They don't want all of that infrastructure costs sunk and not be able to take it with them. So, they have developed uh basically a shipping container that is built in the US and in Texas, I think, and brought in. It takes up one parking space and and has all of the equipment and everything that's necessary to power and
068as many chargers as you need. And then they also use uh K barriers or Jersey barriers um and do the uh the conduit between those above ground. And they've done this in Canada, in Montreal, and the snow has not been an issue. Uh so, it is something to consider to avoid the trenching trenching costs. Um that that is available on the market now. Um and then doing things like um universal pedestal stands with the concrete, so that you can switch out, you know, because the charger technology is going to change. Um and then also um doing the the grading grid instead of new pavement, so that you can get to conduit if you need to. Um we visited a uh facility in Portland uh that's like a megawatt megawatt level charging facility, and that's what
069they had done. It was really interesting. Um so, that's a uh best practice. Something to consider as well. Yeah, thank you so much. That's exactly some of the infrastructure and technology um you know, new things on the market that I was hoping to hear today, and I really really appreciate that. And then I guess the the final question is to Tim and Na- Natalie, how how much collaboration is happening with the interagency on school construction? My answer would be very quick and none. Um I can't speak for Natalie, but I've had no contact uh with that group. I deal a lot with the Department of Education, but I've not dealt with the schools. So, that would make a lot of sense. Um and I would just like to emphasize some of the points that were
070made earlier about, you know, if you're doing stuff and if you can double up with your you know, try and avoid the separate trenching costs, that's a great thing. Trenching is just so expensive, it's ridiculous for putting these installs in. And at the very least, you know, you don't even if you don't put the chargers in, at least if you run that conduit, that just save you so much time. So, I would I would recommend that. And then, um like it was mentioned earlier, you know, there are they're kind of stopgaps, but there are several mobile chargers. I think you guys might be using a mobile charger now or were. So, there are several companies. Uh I just had a meeting with another one last week. They will lease these equipment, and that could be
071a stopgap, you know, like we were saying. There's a bit of a disconnect between the vehicles arriving and the charging infrastructure. So, um there are several companies to do that. And And I would look at, you know, battery storage is also another option because it does allow you, if you have some battery storage, it allows you not to always have the high-speed power draw that you're going to be using for the chargers. So, you know, they these batteries can store the power by charging overnight. And then, they can charge up in the morning, and you're not using as much power at peak time. So, it it is something to look at. But, I'd be very happy to get the name of the person um for the school buildings and go from there. Like I said,
072my contact they usually I work a lot with Gabriel Rose at Department of Education, but I've not worked with that group. So, I think that'd be a great idea. But, maybe Natalie has. Natalie? Um yeah, uh I don't think I have I Like you said, Tim, I I work a lot with Gabriel Rose. Um If anything, someone on our buildings team most likely has worked with that type of group, um potentially on the building decarbonization program, but I myself have not. And but to Tim's point, definitely would be interested in that and start trying to start that conversation just to kind of see we can, you know, meet with those gaps and see where we need to support each other. Yeah. Uh great. Thank you so much. And um you know, that's Alex Donahue, who
073is the the lead of the inner agency on school construction, who has been very generous also with presenting to PGCPS leadership and our county delegation. So, I think there's a lot to collaborate on on here. Um That's Yes, I know who that is. Okay, so I've seen that name. Okay, that makes sense. Great. And And Dorothy, uh I think one more question from Dorothy before we move to the Atlanta presentation. >> really it's not really a question. If I'm allowed to be pushy, um I was just to kind of get things rolling, um would you like um PGCPS to kind of help broker that conversation so so we can get it started so it doesn't just, you know, disappear after this meeting, you know, like next steps. We'd be more than happy to, you know,
074have a meeting with you all, um our units here at PGCPS, and you know, um school construction. Yeah, that'd be great. >> sound? That's perfect. All right, will do. All right, great. Thank you all so much. Um so, next we're moving to our case study, the National um Well, it's the National School Boards Association on April 4th, 2025 tour of the Atlanta Public Schools Northwest Transportation Center. And we are very fortunate to have with us one of our uh tour guides of that day, uh uh Anthony Ashley from the Atlanta Public Schools. And so, what happened with the presentation here is in is Ms. McMillan's going to pull up the presentation is that I I was going to present what I learned. Like, [laughter] I was there and I took a whole bunch of pictures
075and had all this data, and I was creating presentation, then it was like, "We should just hear directly from the team." And we are very fortunate that they had time today. So, for whatever I could add in as someone who took the tour, or also Tish Tablan, who was also there on the tour. Um, we will certainly add perspective, but I think since we have, um, Anthony here with us, we're going to get to hear from the person who did all of this amazing work that you're about to see. So, I will have have you lead that. I think you're still muted. Thank you. I'm talking to the screen instead of a Um, but I I appreciate the opportunity to be here with you. Uh, uh, the rest of some of the other members of
076the team had some other obligations that they had to take care of, but I am here to talk about our experience, um, with the, uh, Northwest Transportation Center. Um, this was a this this was about 15 years in the making. And I'm going to say, uh, that because what what happened, um, initially was there was a plan that, um, we needed to build a second depot. Uh, we only had one at the time, and we had a off-site support facility elsewhere. And obviously uh, uh, monetary priorities, uh, and different priorities that happened, uh, ended up putting off the actual start of this project, uh, until it happened. But, the good part about that is that because the project had been started initially, as it as time passed, the priorities changed. So, obviously, environmental sustainability came
077to the fore a lot more than it was when the project was originally started. And then, the availability of the electric school bus, that also came up because we were uh at that point, we were actually moving towards propane. And our fleet [clears throat] right now has about 135 propane buses and it So, we when this came up, we actually started to look at how we were going to design this facility to support the electric school bus. And uh it it was we had a lot of conversations, not uh not only with um the local utility, which is Georgia Power, but we had conversations with uh different people in the the bus sphere. And I'm going to say that WRI was extremely helpful and at this time because if you're think we're thinking back in
0782021, okay? So, you can just imagine there's not that much information. Everybody's all over the place. Uh you can't get straight answers. You can get I can do this, but I'm not really sure it'll be our first. And WRI at that point really had a basic foundation of how uh in in helping us plan out how we wanted to do this. So, what we as soon as the ESB came up, we were ready because we were already thinking about buying demo uh electric buses. And we once that came up, it allowed us to purchase a many more than we wanted to because we're only going to buy two demos because of the price. But, we increased that number when the when the CSB came up to 25. So, it it was a definite uh process
079that that that we went through. Now, um according to our slide here, we're talking about we bought Lion buses. That, in hindsight, probably wasn't wasn't the best uh uh actual um decision to make, but it actually worked out for us because we bought these 25 buses um after uh we they were all delivered. And once Lion uh actually went through the difficulties that it went through, we actually uh pr um um we contracted with the technician that actually was servicing our buses to be permanent uh here and service our our our fleet. And then we used our logistics partner, which is NAPA, to uh establish supply lines to keep our buses uh running. And it's worked out really well right now. I think we're one of the few people with Lion buses that don't have
080a lot of problems. So, back back to the str- infrastructure. Um the Northwest uh property, once we decided that we were going to go for the um electric school bus, we had to design uh the actual facility around um not just uh environmental sustainability, but around also the electric school bus itself. So, we did what what your um earlier presenters talked about. We actually put in um 11 charging stations with dual hoses, CP6000s. And what we did, we actually added 11 additional pedestals with conduit so that we can expand at any given time in the future on that on that particular property. And then we also have uh three CP uh which are level three chargers. Uh and we've discovered in our in obviously in in in running these buses that we don't need them
081that much. Uh maybe emergency but we have the capability of charging at level three uh um on our buses uh two-hour charge from uh say 20% to 80%. Um and so we can actually turn around a bus pretty quickly if we need to. But we don't really have we don't really need to. Now for the facility itself there's a lot of shareholders that came into that. We we we created uh working teams with the drivers uh staff um and we sat down and we talked about wants versus needs versus what we could do versus what we couldn't do and we got the architects involved um and we sat down and we came up with a plan that everybody liked. Uh plus the materials that were picked um were basically everything was kind of going towards
082sustainability uh of our environment and and durability of the uh the facility itself. Now in some of these pictures you can see that the a lot of these the work spaces were designed with utilizing the spaces as best we could uh to to be able to get maximum uh usage comfort for the actual employees that work there as as as as you know um being able to maximize it all, the usage of what we were doing. Um as far as the lot, now that we got real big assistance here from the city of Atlanta because they have they they've done a lot of this kind of work. So, if you look at the gardens and if you look at the the the pavement uh with the rainwater permeability, we got a lot of assistance from
083the city of Atlanta with that. And cuz they've done they've done a lot of this kind of work prior and we didn't have to do too much to to get what we got. We just told them what we were looking for, they said no problem, we've done this before, and this is this is how we ended up with a lot of a lot of things that we ended up with. So, we had partners at each step of the way, whether it be WRI, whether it be city of Atlanta, uh state DOT, everybody had a piece of this making this project successful. Um next slide. All right, and as you can see, this is the uh these are the chargers that we got we we actually have we actually went with ChargePoint, and at the time
084that we went with ChargePoint, we did it because we wanted to go with somebody who was reliable and who had uh managed chargers and who had a subscription plan where they would manage the chargers and not us. So, these chargers are monitored 24/7. Um they're basically uh anytime anything goes wrong with them, they'll come and they'll maintain them. As you can see, they're all set up on pedestals. We have another row with pedestals um ready for additional chargers if we need it. Uh BCP 6000s will put out 19.2 kW, and they'll fuel two buses simultaneously. So, um right now, they they work perfect for for what we need them to do. Um to the right I know it's a bad word, propane. We have we have a propane infrastructure set up there. Um we work
085with our uh local um gas provider, which is Amerigas. Um and something I should add to this. Uh working with Amerigas in Georgia here, uh the infrastructure is provided by Amerigas. The infrastructure the uh the only thing that we had to do on this site uh as far as gas was lay the underground piping, but as far as the tanks, as far as the bollards, all that other stuff, that was provided for by our gas provider. Um the only thing that we pay for is the bulk propane drops. Um as far as any maintenance on on these uh on this infrastructure, they take care of it by themselves. Not a It's not a plug, I'm just telling you what what we do. Um and so it tends to work really well. Okay, and this this
086slide here just kind of gives you some of the ideas of how the site was laid out. For example, that bus wash is uh it's all recycled water um going through that uh so we tend to save a lot there. In the garage, when we sat down and had meetings about it, you know, to get super hot here in Georgia, um we use these uh fans. Uh I'm not going to call them by their their their trade name, but we we use the fans on the ceiling and um they actually move a lot of air to keep the uh facility uh pretty cool on uh super hot days. So, there's a lot of thought process that went into this before, and I I I'm watching what you uh listening to what's going on in Maryland.
087It seems like you guys are really thinking through what you're trying to do going forward and um I think you'll be successful. All right. Thank you so much, Mr. Mr. Ashley and thank you for that background information that that um unit 15 years, that sounds like construction projects here in PGCPS at times. So, so we feel your we relate to your pain. Um so um you know, I I just wanted to add a little bit about be you know, being there and seeing your team and your uh your your you know, sort of your business partners, right? You know, all the companies that contributed that I that what I took away was the um that you had a lot of communication and collaboration, you know, very positive relationships and you know, you were able to
088create a team of you know, from Atlanta Public Schools and of the vendors to solve the the problem. So, that was something that was very clear to me as a school board member visiting and and seeing um you know, seeing your presentation. I I thought I might ask if Tish might like to add her impressions from the tour as well. Um it was awesome visiting. I'm glad you shared your photos. It kind of uh reminded me of all the things that I saw there, but um I I think what also impressed me, Anthony, was kind of your team that you had that was all on board from all You had different speakers from um different parts of your district or you know different team members from across different departments speaking. Um really kind of all
089in unison about what it took to plan it, to um install it, operate it. Um yeah, it was all very impressive. So, I love love hearing how Atlanta Public Schools pulled it off and also, you know, such a big large-scale school district um with a lot of moving parts. So, um yeah. I'd actually love to hear more um from Anthony kind of what your future plans are, if you think you'll be applying for future clean school bus um funds, of course, depending on what, you know, how it's structured when it rolls out, but just curious kind of um what your future plans are. I I I think we're waiting to see exactly what that looks like because um I'm talking to OEMs, talking to engine manufacturers. It it it's Everybody thinks that they're in the
090pot this time. So, when I say that, what I mean is uh the focus is not uh EVs as it was before. Now, you know, this diesel guy thinks he's in there. This this propane guy thinks he's in there. So, there's a lot going on there. It it has to shake out to see exactly um what's going to happen. But, for for us, I've been looking at um EVs. And I've actually been looking at a particular OEM that I I want to try and I've I've gotten some uh really good feedback on because I've been talking to other school districts across the country that use that OEM. And so, I think we're going to look at what as soon as the the funds what what's going on with the CSB going forward settles out, I
091think we're going to be buying some more. I I can't put a number on it because I don't know what the what's going to happen. Great. Thank you for sharing. Uh any I'll watch for hands for um now questions from the the committee members. Uh we could start with um I see Director Baldwin. Yes, thank you, ma'am. And thank you so much for the presentation. Um it really um is good to see other districts um especially comparable sizes um be successful in this project. I'm just curious to see the reception of staff uh your drivers who are driving the electric bus versus the propane versus your diesel. Um What have What has been some of their feedback? I'm glad you asked that question. >> [laughter] >> Um EV bus drivers love EV buses. They tend
092to refer to them as their Cadillacs, okay? Um this is not like double, of course. I haven't done any studies, but one of the things that they all say is because the fact of because of the fact that the bus is quieter, that they maintain control of the of their uh environment, children, you know, uh much easier. Um children love the quieter bus. Uh obviously the the the community does. One of the things they also like about the bus is its performance uh because it uh, you know, obviously instant torque. Uh, and it can move off the line a little quicker. Um, and in addition, they also tend to, um, like the HVAC systems. So, the HVAC systems tend, uh, I would have to say that they're they're pretty robust, okay? All right. So, that's
093that's the EV thing. Everybody loves the EV, but not everybody wants to drive one. Because they, uh, some of them feel that there's additional, I think it's additional pressure to drive an EV that they don't want to to put on themselves. All right. So, let's move to the propane. Propane, they love the propane also because, uh, same thing that they're they're instant torque, they're they've, uh, we've even taken some when we got the propane buses, it was a thing. We kept them because we we were told about range issues as far as going out of town on trip, uh, field trips and things like that. We're told that we should probably keep them close. Well, some of them started to slip out and go outside our 50-mi range and then so, now we we have
094propane buses that go that'll do 125 mi. You know, and so, the range issue is not an issue anymore. And we also have a network here in Georgia that we can with other school districts that we can also, if something happens on that front, we can, uh, they can support us and as we can them. So, we actually have positive experiences with the with the propane buses also. In our diesels, we we're running the newest iteration of Cummins 6.8. What can you say? It's just a reliable workhorse. Um And so, each one brings something different to the table. Some drivers don't want to drive anything but the the diesels. Some drive But some drivers will don't want to drive anything but the EVs. So, it's something for everybody. That's all I can say. Hey, thank
095you. Um the Tim? Yeah. Yeah. Um Anthony, I had just had two quick operational questions. I'm not sure you have. What's your average or maybe longest bus route, mileage-wise a day a day? Do you happen to know? Yes. Uh longest bus route is going to be a um miles. Okay. And um another question for charging, do you charge up between route between morning and afternoon? Do you just really charge them up after at the end of the day for overnight? Or do you do both? Or is it just Good question. When we originally When we initially got them, we we uh because of range anxiety from the drivers, Right. we charged during the daytime. So, when they came in from their routes about 9:00, 10:00, they would charge and then they'd pull them out >>
096Top off. and and head out. >> [snorts] >> They don't do that anymore. Uh most of the time they come in uh usually when they come in, there's at least 60 60 to 70% charge left. They head out, they do their afternoon runs. Now, if I have it's uh We've just recently started doing field trips in the afternoon, which obviously is additional mileage. So, those drivers will come in, plug in, and top off so that when they go back out on their afternoon runs, they can they can support field trips. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Britney? Thank you. I I just wanted to really comment and agree on all of his positive attitude towards this whole process. Jessica Wong, one of my colleagues, has worked very closely with Anthony. As I said, you know, we've
097been in the passenger seat while he's been in the driver's seat learning along the way and we have we've been able to share a lot of the lessons learned and that he has you know, he's been a trailblazer with and you know, even the fact that you're able to talk about what happened with the lion buses and that you're still going to buy new electric buses. Like I I have heard you know, not the same sentiment from others with negative experiences and so, you know, really just appreciate that and the fact that you have been willing to share your technician's knowledge with all the other school districts that are operating these buses that don't have that talent and have you know, help facilitate connections and everything. So, really just appreciate all that you've been doing
098there and and being, you know, so accessible for us to bring other school districts to even to talk to. Um on that I wanted to ask about so a little bit back to panel's uh talk question about building out infrastructure for the new future and field trips. Uh something that comes up all the time causing a lot of anxiety. You know, oh we can't do the field trips because we can't fuel. Um curious if that has been something that you have not experienced with other I know there's other districts in Georgia level so electric school buses have you talked at all about utilizing each other's chargers when if they come to your facility for the games or anything like that and how is that working maybe just quickly touching on charging strategy is that I
099know that's a big new piece of space. So um well that's a great question because um Bibb County just got their uh 15 buses and we just talked we just talked to them about having uh uh being able to access our chargers if they need if they came to Atlanta for any activity. I told them that they that we were here we were open for them if they needed any any support. You know and um as far as us uh our buses on field trips we haven't had any issues with you know we plan up one thing that I do want to point out with us using the ChargePoint network okay? We can use any ChargePoint charger. So if I send a bus down to Macon anywhere I can use ChargePoint's charger. We have a
100little RFID card we just give to the driver and they can use the chargers anywhere. So that's that was something that appealed to us in their in their selling you know they was when they were selling it to us that we could access any of the chargers in Georgia um through in their network and so that is how it's set up now and that's a that's a big thing because when you use a lot of different especially uh charging infrastructures of others they don't have that network it's just what you have on your property. And so um with with the access to ChargePoint's network, um we we definitely uh feel feel that we have something there additional that we can use. Any other questions? All right, I'm not seeing other any other hands raised. Um
101I'll go ahead and ask my question. I was wondering if since you're uh an urban district, if you're to have more bus lots for electric school bus expansion, if you're facing any land use issues that that you might have some lessons learned to share with us around uh the the planning of the where they're located, if that's something that's happening in Atlanta. Um not in our districts, but in adjacent districts, they're so um and the county next to us, which is DeKalb, they they're just receiving their first uh electric buses. And something that your you know, previous panelists brought up, they have buses and no infrastructure. Okay, so they had to we had to kind of support them with three of their about three four of their buses until they could actually get something set
102up with some with somebody else. Um I don't think we have we don't have a lot of problems here as far as setting up um infrastructure. The only thing that that we have here is that doing you have you have to actually have the utility do a study to see if that area that you want to place your infrastructure and can support that. Okay? Um and that's kind of the very first thing that we did here. So, if you say, "I want lot A to be my EV lot." then you have to have a you have to have a a study done so that they can see if lot A has the infrastructure from the utilities to support that. Um and if you do, usually once that happens that's the only obstacle that you have
103here. Uh and to typically if you're in any commercial area, you the infrastructure can support what you're trying to do. So, that's the only obstacle I've seen up to this point. I think he's >> There's no NIMBY stuff going on or anything like that. So, >> [laughter] >> No no electric buses in my backyard. Yeah, I would say um Anthony, I'm actually Atlanta native. I um went to elementary, middle, and high school in DeKalb County. So, sad to hear that. Um but I also say I think city of Atlanta is unique in that um you know, as a as a city they have really um ambitious climate goals. Um I don't know uh there are not many other cities I've seen um that are doing as well with just spreading out EV chargers through their
104local parks, through you know, when I go to Atlanta I'm always impressed um compared to where I live in Virginia how many EV chargers are in um city of Atlanta specifically. Yeah, that really throws me off a lot cuz you know, the what I've seen all these chargers and the stations that are here in Atlanta and you go other places and you go where are the chargers? You know, and yeah, we just we we just assume that it's like that everywhere, but it's not. Yeah. So. Yeah, well, thank you both so much for for additional context and I'm not seeing any other hands. I'm going to move to adjournment, but first I just wanted to thank all of our guest experts. You have added so much more information for us to consider as we move
105to our our as we move through data gathering which were we are close to finishing with our June meeting. We we move towards findings and recommendations and this group I I want to thank you for bring you know making it possible for us to do our job better as a work as a work group by taking the time to share your expertise with us. So with that I will move to item 4.1 the adjournment. The chair informs the public that the next electric school bus and bus lot modernization focus work group meeting will be held on June 17th, 2026. Please continue to check the PGCPS board webpage for more information and updates. There being no further business, the time is now 5:08 and the May 13th, 2026 electric school bus and bus lot modernization focus
106work group meeting is adjourned. Thank you all so much and have a great evening. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Thank you, everyone.