2005 North Carolina Code - General Statutes § 115C-250. Authority to expend funds for transportation of children with special needs.

§ 115C‑250.  Authority to expend funds for transportation of children with special needs.

(a)       The State Board of Education and local boards of education may expend public funds for transportation of handicapped children with special needs who are unable because of their handicap to ride the regular school buses and who have been placed in programs by a local school board as a part of its duty to provide such children with a free appropriate education, including its duty under G.S. 115C‑115. At the option of the local board of education with the concurrence of the State Board of Education, funds appropriated to the State Board of Education for contract transportation of exceptional children may be used to purchase buses and minibuses as well as for the purposes authorized in the budget. The State Board of Education shall adopt rules and regulations concerning the construction and equipment of these buses and minibuses.

The Departments of Health and Human Services, Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, and Correction may also expend public funds for transportation of handicapped children with special needs who are unable because of their handicap to ride the regular school buses and who have been placed in programs by one of these agencies as a part of that agency's duty to provide such children with a free appropriate public education.

If a local area mental health center places a child with special needs in an educational program, the local area mental health center shall pay for the transportation of the child, if handicapped and unable because of the handicap to ride the regular school buses, to the program.

(b)       Funds appropriated for the transportation of children with special needs may be used to pay transportation safety assistants employed in accordance with the provisions of G.S. 115C‑245(e) for buses to which children with special needs are assigned. (1955, c. 1372, art. 21, s. 6; 1973, c. 1351, s. 1; 1975, c. 678, ss. 9, 10; 1977, c. 830, s. 1; 1979, c. 719, ss. 1‑4; 1979, 2nd Sess., c. 1156; 1981, c. 423, s. 1; c. 912, s. 1; 1981 (Reg. Sess., 1982), c. 1282, s. 31; 1985, c. 479, s. 26(b); 1987, c. 769; 1997‑443, s. 11A.118(a); 1998‑202, s. 4(n); 2000‑137, s. 4(q).)