Can a Tennessee municipal school district charge students a fee to ride the school bus?
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This page answers the general question as of 2015. Ezel answers yours: what it means for your facts, under current Tennessee law, with citations.
Plain-English summary
Tennessee statute lets all boards of education provide transportation for students, including those who live less than 1.5 miles from school (Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2101(a), (b)). The only fee restriction is in § 49-6-2103: "No pupil shall be charged a fee by the county board of education or by any employee of the board for the privilege of being transported with public funds to any public school." That prohibition, by its plain terms, runs only against county boards of education.
The AG applies the canon expressio unius est exclusio alterius (the expression of one thing is the exclusion of another). When the legislature says "boards of education" in § 49-6-2101 (broadly inclusive) but then in § 49-6-2103 specifies "county board of education" (narrower), the difference is presumed purposeful (Overstreet v. TRW Commercial Steering Division; City of Knoxville v. Brown). If the legislature had wanted to ban transportation fees by all boards, including municipal boards, it could have said so. It did not.
So a Tennessee municipal board of education was free to charge transportation fees, including:
- Fees to students not included in the BEP transportation funding calculation (those living within 1.5 miles of the school).
- Fees to all students to make up the gap between BEP transportation funding and the actual cost of providing transportation.
The opinion does not address whether municipal-board fees might run afoul of other constraints (federal Title VI, IDEA transportation requirements for students with disabilities, state non-discrimination rules, or local charter limitations), nor whether free or reduced-fare programs might be required for low-income families.
Currency note
This opinion was issued in 2015. Subsequent statutory amendments, court decisions, or later AG opinions may have changed the analysis. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, deadline, or remedy mentioned here.
Common questions
Q: What is the BEP?
A: The Basic Education Program is Tennessee's funding formula for K-12 public schools. It includes a component for transportation. BEP does not generally cover transportation for students living within 1.5 miles of school, because state policy traditionally treated that distance as walkable.
Q: Why does Tennessee draw the line between county and municipal boards?
A: The statutory drafting history is not detailed in this opinion, but the practical distinction may reflect that county school systems often cover larger, more rural areas where transportation is essential and statutorily underwritten. Municipal systems, especially in older urban areas, can be more compact, with families closer to schools.
Q: Does the opinion impose any limits on the fee?
A: No. The AG addressed only whether a fee is permissible under state law, not what amount would be lawful. Other constraints (constitutional, federal, contractual, local charter) might apply.
Q: Can a county board ever charge for transportation?
A: Under § 49-6-2103, no, when the transportation is "with public funds." That phrase is the statutory hook. Whether a county could ever charge for purely private or extracurricular transportation depends on facts the opinion does not address.
Q: What about IDEA or 504 transportation for students with disabilities?
A: Federal disability-rights law generally requires transportation as a related service when needed, free of charge. The AG opinion does not address those overlays, which would constrain a fee structure regardless of state law.
Background and statutory framework
Tennessee's two-track school-governance structure (county systems and city/special-school-district systems) traces back to the 19th century and has produced parallel but not identical statutory rules in many areas. Section 49-6-2101 captures the common point: all boards may transport students. Section 49-6-2103 captures the divergent point: only county boards face a statutory fee ban.
The opinion's interpretive move is straightforward Tennessee statutory construction: when the legislature uses different language in adjacent sections of the same statutory scheme, that difference matters. Overstreet and City of Knoxville v. Brown both apply that canon to similar facts. The opinion does not engage with whether the rule is wise policy. It says only what the rule is.
Citations and references
Statutes:
- Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 49-6-2101 et seq. (transportation of public school students)
- Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2101(a), (b) (authority to transport students)
- Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2103 (county-board fee prohibition)
Cases:
- Overstreet v. TRW Commercial Steering Div., 256 S.W.3d 626 (Tenn. 2008) (Tennessee Supreme Court; expressio unius)
- City of Knoxville v. Brown, 195 Tenn. 501, 260 S.W.2d 264 (Tenn. 1953) (Tennessee Supreme Court)
Subject
Opinion No. 15-10, Transportation for Elementary and Secondary School Students, February 3, 2015
Source
- Landing page: https://www.tn.gov/attorneygeneral/opinions.html
- Original PDF: https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/attorneygeneral/documents/ops/2015/op15-10.pdf
Original opinion text
STATE OF TENNESSEE
OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
February 3, 2015
Opinion No. 15-10
Transportation for Elementary and Secondary School Students
QUESTIONS
- Are there any restrictions on transportation fees charged by municipal boards of education?
If yes, then:
-
Is it permissible to charge a transportation fee to students not included in the BEP calculation for transportation funding (students living within 1.5 miles of the school)?
-
Is it permissible to charge a transportation fee to all students to generate the funding necessary to bridge the difference between the transportation funds provided under the BEP formula and the total cost of delivering transportation services?
OPINION
There are no restrictions on the transportation fees that can be charged by municipal boards of education.
ANALYSIS
Tennessee Code Annotated §§ 49-6-2101, et seq., is the state law that addresses the transportation of elementary and secondary school students. The applicable statute allows all boards of education to provide transportation for children to the schools in which they are enrolled, including transportation for children who live less than one and one half (1 ½) miles by the nearest accessible route from their assigned school. Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2101 (a), (b).
The only limitation regarding fees that may be charged for providing transportation is found at Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2103: "No pupil shall be charged a fee by the county board of education [emphasis supplied] or by any employee of the board for the privilege of being transported with public funds to any public school." Thus, on its face, the prohibition on charging fees applies only to county boards of education.
To the extent that there is any ambiguity about the scope of the § 49-6-2103 restriction on charging fees, the ambiguity is resolved by the rule of statutory construction known as "expressio unius est exclusio alterius" (the expression of one thing is the exclusion of another). When the legislature includes particular language in one section of a statute but omits it in another section of the same act, it is generally presumed that the legislature acted purposefully concerning the subjects included and excluded. See, e.g., Overstreet v. TRW Commercial Steering Div., 256 S.W.3d 626, 633 (Tenn. 2008); City of Knoxville v. Brown, 195 Tenn. 501, 510, 260 S.W.2d 264, 267 (Tenn. 1953).
Tennessee Code Annotated § 49-6-2101, which deals with the provision of transportation services, is broadly inclusive. It refers to "boards of education" generally. On the other hand, Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2103, which prohibits transportation charges, refers only and specifically to county boards of education. Thus, application of the "expressio unius" rule of construction leads to the conclusion that the legislature intended to allow all boards of education to provide transportation services to pupils and, at the same time, intended to prohibit only county boards of education from charging pupils for those services. Had the General Assembly wished to prohibit all boards of education from charging for transportation, it could have referred simply to "boards of education" in Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2103, just as it did in Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2101. Similarly, had the General Assembly wished to prohibit municipal boards of education from charging for transportation, it could have included that specific language in in Tenn. Code Ann. § 49-6-2103. Because it did not, but instead referred specifically and solely to county boards of education, we conclude that there are no restrictions on the transportation fees that can be charged by municipal boards of education.
HERBERT H. SLATERY III
Attorney General and Reporter
ANDRÉE SOPHIA BLUMSTEIN
Solicitor General
GREGORY W. HOLT
Senior Counsel
Requested by:
The Honorable Mark White
State Representative
110 War Memorial Building
Nashville, Tennessee 37243
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