It seems like it's not BusPatrol, but a company they acquired (Force Multiplier Solutions) that had corrupt leadership. I'm not sure how exactly that went down, or if the same people are still involved, but it does sound pretty bad. Apparently the corruption here caused the Dallas County Schools to go bankrupt and ultimately to be shut down and the school district split into other surrounding districts to take over.
This is the first that I'm hearing about this, but I don't think that your telling is quite right. The Dallas school district is "Dallas ISD", not Dallas County Schools.
Dallas County Schools was apparently a school bus service provider that served many different school districts in the area. I don't know why they named it that...
That situation looks pretty bad, but what happened was that a public school bus services provider went bankrupt, the school districts that it served became responsible for finding private replacement service providers, and residents of the service area had their property taxes raised to pay off the debt.
No school districts went bankrupt or were split up, just school bus service providers.
While I'm sympathetic to a lot of privacy concerns, how hard is it to simply not be an asshole and not pass school buses when they have their flashing lights out?
Also, every car with a dashcam or built in cameras is basically already this. Where I live every intersection has cameras. Most of the buildings. It's not like this is anything new and honestly, probably a better use of cameras than most of the other applications.
b) when it does it's usually some stupid situation where robotic adherence to the lights is in poor taste (like a bus picking up or discharging an entire team on a right side curb, or a divided median) albeit legally mandated.
Wish granted, now cameras are put up on every walk path and bus stop instead, as people keep getting robbed to/from the stores, so while the school buses aren't fitted with cameras, the streets are instead.
Condoning the surveillance state because it makes the things they want people to like less comparatively worse is exactly the sort of evil "use anything as leverage to advance my goals" behavior is exactly how we got here.
I, for one, do not wish to smell my malodorous coworkers - who have walked or cycled to work and are all sweaty - all day. I already have one of them and it makes me want to vomit.
There are ways to gently inform the person(s) of your discomfort. If communicated well, it can be settled. In one case I dealt with, body odour of someone on my team was causing another person distress, but some gentle, kind advice (yes, it was embarrassing as hell so we did it in private) and a quick trip by him to the shops for some deodorant resolved the problem almost instantly. Here's hoping.
Judging by the enthusiasm for hosted AI models and tools like Claude Code on Hacker News, I don't think people care much about surveillance anymore.
This has been an ongoing concern (internal surveillance of children and drivers, external of other traffic) for at least two months now:
* They're Putting AI Cameras In School Buses (April 7th 2026) - https://www.usermag.co/p/theyre-putting-ai-cameras-in-school
* School bus Driver Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoAvL1MoTIA
Look up the history of this company, bus patrol - they're felons and in prison.
Who'd have thought a bus company would run buses for the various applications that buses are used for.
I read a few different articles such as https://www.thenewspaper.com/news/67/6717.asp and https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/corrupt-public-official-sen...
It seems like it's not BusPatrol, but a company they acquired (Force Multiplier Solutions) that had corrupt leadership. I'm not sure how exactly that went down, or if the same people are still involved, but it does sound pretty bad. Apparently the corruption here caused the Dallas County Schools to go bankrupt and ultimately to be shut down and the school district split into other surrounding districts to take over.
This is the first that I'm hearing about this, but I don't think that your telling is quite right. The Dallas school district is "Dallas ISD", not Dallas County Schools.
Dallas County Schools was apparently a school bus service provider that served many different school districts in the area. I don't know why they named it that...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dallas_County_Schools
That situation looks pretty bad, but what happened was that a public school bus services provider went bankrupt, the school districts that it served became responsible for finding private replacement service providers, and residents of the service area had their property taxes raised to pay off the debt.
No school districts went bankrupt or were split up, just school bus service providers.
While I'm sympathetic to a lot of privacy concerns, how hard is it to simply not be an asshole and not pass school buses when they have their flashing lights out?
Also, every car with a dashcam or built in cameras is basically already this. Where I live every intersection has cameras. Most of the buildings. It's not like this is anything new and honestly, probably a better use of cameras than most of the other applications.
The concern is the sharing of such surveillance with law enforcement and other government agencies.
a) it doesn't actually happen that often
b) when it does it's usually some stupid situation where robotic adherence to the lights is in poor taste (like a bus picking up or discharging an entire team on a right side curb, or a divided median) albeit legally mandated.
Source: bus driver in the family
Maybe design cities to be walkable and bikeable so that you have the option get things done without driving a car which is inherently trackable?
Wish granted, now cameras are put up on every walk path and bus stop instead, as people keep getting robbed to/from the stores, so while the school buses aren't fitted with cameras, the streets are instead.
I'll take it a step further.
Condoning the surveillance state because it makes the things they want people to like less comparatively worse is exactly the sort of evil "use anything as leverage to advance my goals" behavior is exactly how we got here.
I, for one, do not wish to smell my malodorous coworkers - who have walked or cycled to work and are all sweaty - all day. I already have one of them and it makes me want to vomit.
There are many ways to avoid this. The problem is your co-worker, not cyclists.
There are ways to gently inform the person(s) of your discomfort. If communicated well, it can be settled. In one case I dealt with, body odour of someone on my team was causing another person distress, but some gentle, kind advice (yes, it was embarrassing as hell so we did it in private) and a quick trip by him to the shops for some deodorant resolved the problem almost instantly. Here's hoping.