WHIDBEY NEWS-TIMES: Public, board support green school initiatives

Karina Andrew reports from the Oak Harbor School District board meeting on Apr. 25, 2022.

The Oak Harbor School Board formally endorsed a proposal to petition the state legislature for green infrastructure funds for school districts April 25, during the same meeting in which it voted to purchase two new diesel-powered school buses.

Members of the public attended the meeting to weigh in on the actions, with most commenters voicing support for the electrification of the school district’s bus fleet and other eco-friendly measures and encouraging the board to invest in electric buses.

They Said It

[Oak Harbor School Director Bob Hallahan, who submitted the proposal:] “Because it’s a state goal for districts to get the carbon out, they have an interest in helping us, and we all have an interest in making it happen quickly,” Hallahan said in an interview with the Whidbey News-Times.

“I feel like this proposal violates several of our core values,” [Hallahan] said of the motion to buy the diesel buses during Monday’s meeting, adding that he felt they had a responsibility to use existing technology to address the climate issue now and “not push the problem onto yet another generation like our parents pushed it onto ours.”

Former school board candidate Jessica Thompson urged school board members not to support Hallahan’s legislation priority proposal, saying the green initiative “comes with a price tag,” and instead asked the board to “urge WSSDA to address a much more important issue that heavily impacts our democracy and our children far more than whether or not they have green school buses or green cooking methods in the kitchen.”