Bud Kaelin says his sixth-grade son now faces a 3.5-mile walk home after Ramona Unified axed the boy’s bus stop amid route cuts.
Kaelin, a construction worker in the San Diego County district, said San Diego that officials eliminated the stop at 14th and H streets when they consolidated routes. The district deemed the old location unsafe, but refused to let the boy board at another stop, leaving the family with no bus access at all.
“They cut us off completely from getting any kind of a ride on the school bus,” Kaelin told the outlet.
Ramona Unified’s policy limits bus rides to middle and high school students who live more than 2.5 miles from campus. The district measures that distance in a straight line, “as the crow flies,” rather than tracking the actual streets children must walk. That formula has drawn sharp criticism from parents who say it ignores ground-level reality.
“As the crow flies is, you know, pretty, pretty vague. And yeah our kids don’t fly… They walk,” parent Mary Emily said San Diego.
Kaelin said he does not want his son walking more than a mile, particularly during the ongoing heatwave baking Southern California. He laid out a specific fear about what could go wrong on the long trek home.
“Could he be in some kind of serious situation where, like, he was feeling heat exhaustion and his vision was impaired trying to cross the street, and he thought it was a stop car, but it wasn’t and he walked out in front of that car?” he asked.
To avoid that risk, Kaelin began leaving his construction job three hours early every day during the first week of classes to collect his son himself. He said the schedule change carried a steep professional cost.
“Today, my boss just told me it looks like the crew cost is getting heavy. So, that’s not going to be good for me tomorrow,” Kaelin said.
Emily’s own 15-year-old daughter was hit by the same route consolidation. The district eliminated a stop on Hope Street, leaving the teenager with roughly a quarter-mile walk to reach the next available bus stop. Emily questioned the district’s decision-making process and pressed for transparency about how officials choose which stops to keep.
“What are the stats that we’re looking at? Is it the number of kids per stop? Is it, you know, how much money is coming out of this stop?”
She also accused administrators of applying safety standards inconsistently.
“You’re picking and choosing here, like one day. ‘It’s not a safety concern. It’s as a crow flies. Y’all eat the s–t sandwich and deal with it.’ And this is what we’re doing. And then the next it’s ‘well, that’s a safety concern,'” she said.
Ramona Unified informed families by letter that an ongoing bus driver shortage forced the route consolidations. The district defended the changes as the safest available method to maintain transportation for the maximum number of students possible.
In the viral moment that brought national attention to the district’s struggles, Kaelin’s account of his son’s 3.5-mile potential walk and his own job loss crystallized how the driver shortage is hitting individual families. The story spread as temperatures across Southern California climbed into dangerous territory, amplifying concerns about children exposed to extreme heat during lengthy walks.
The district has not announced any reversal of the consolidated routes or changes to its 2.5-mile “as the crow flies” eligibility standard.