BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana's Department of Environmental Quality says it plans to prioritize funds received from a Volkswagen settlement to replace old diesel school buses.
The Advocate reports that a new report from the department says public schools that buy new, cleaner-burning diesel models are eligible for a 25 percent refund from the state, while buses that run on alternative fuels can be reimbursed up to half their value.
The reimbursements will be drawn from the $18 million Louisiana will receive over the next three years from Volkswagen's settlement over Clean Air Act violations.
The report says that the reimbursement program only provides for bus replacements, not fleet expansions.
The state has also proposed allocating up to a third of the settlement money to replace Department of Transportation and Development vehicles.
