Since 2011, motorists have disobeyed stop signs attached to school buses nearly 200 times, putting kids boarding or exiting the bus in danger each time.
It's called a stop-arm violation. And the Kankakee County Sheriff's Department is teaming up with school districts to reduce the number of violations with the help of cameras.
When a bus is picking up or dropping off students, lights are activated and an arm with a stop sign is deployed warning motorists to stop while children board the bus or cross the street.
On a single day this year, more than 108,000 school bus drivers in 29 states reported being illegally passed by 85,279 vehicles, according to the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services. While plenty of people are breaking a law put in place to keep children safe, stop-arm violations rarely result in fatalities.
In 2009 — the most recent data available — five children were killed by vehicles passing school buses, according to the 2009-10 National School Bus Loading Unloading Survey.
