Ritenour School District Accesses Electric School Bus Grant Money to Complete Project
The Ritenour School District is excited to announce that on Feb. 19, 2025, the federal account holding the grant funds from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the district’s electric school bus fleet was unsuspended.
“We had remained optimistic that the funds would be released and that we would be able to get to the finish line with our electric bus project,” said Ritenour Superintendent Dr. Chris Kilbride. “Although it was frustrating that the funds had been suspended, in the end, we are happy that we will have 24 electric school buses that were promised as part of the EPA grant and that no local funds were used.”
On Feb. 4, 2025, Ritenour celebrated the first three electric (EV) school buses of a 24-EV bus fleet, thanks to a $9,495,000 grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as part of its Clean School Bus Program. With the 2024 federal grant, Ritenour will replace 24 diesel buses with EV buses. This is the largest EPA Clean School Bus grant given to a school district in the St. Louis area.
Ritenour had been unable to access the grant funds beginning Jan. 29, 2025 to pay vendors for the work they recently completed as part of the EPA grant for 24 electric school buses and charging stations. The electric buses will replace aging diesel buses. The district had been able to draw money from the account before Jan. 29 to pay for three EV buses that had arrived in Ritenour in January. However, it was unable to access the remaining grant money for the other 21 EV buses and 24 installed charging stations due to the account being suspended as a result of a Jan. 20 executive order.
On Feb. 19, the district was able to draw down the EPA grant funds to pay for work completed for its new electric bus fleet. The district drew the final $8.32 million from the account to pay its vendors for the completed charging stations and for the 21 EV buses that now can be delivered from Litchfield, IL to Ritenour’s bus depot in Overland, MO.
For more about Ritenour’s EV bus program, click here.