Northport forced to borrow buses to get students to school

School was delayed Monday morning after vandalism grounded four of Northport's five buses, resulting in thousands of dollars in damage.

Northport Public School superintendent Tyrus Wessell said that sometime between 7 p.m. Monday and 7 a.m. Tuesday, a vandal or vandals broke into four school buses and smashed electrical components.

The vandalism disabled the buses, forcing school officials to call on Suttons Bay Public Schools for help. Northport borrowed four Suttons Bay buses so students could get to school, but classes were delayed about 60 minutes.

“We had to delay the start of school today, our first day back from spring break, by an hour as about half our students had to wait for the buses,” he said.

The incident is being investigated by the county Sheriff’s Department.

“Whoever did this (caused) considerable damage to the electrical components. The damage will not be in the hundreds of dollars, it will be in the thousands,” Wessell said.

Deputy Mark Stevens, who is investigating the case, said Rick Deering, the superintendent of maintenance for the school district, inspected each bus Monday. “He went in and started up each bus to make sure they were ready to go for the start of school Tuesday,” Stevens said.

Stevens said each bus will have to be towed to Traverse City for repair. “Based on what the mechanic … told Mr. Deering, they are looking at several thousand dollars to repair each bus,” he said, adding that there are no suspects in the investigation.

Wessell said he visited each class Tuesday, told students what happened and encouraged them to come forward if they had information on who might be responsible. Stevens said anyone who might have seen or heard something should call 256-8696 or the Sheriff’s Department general office number, 256-8800. “We’ll take anonymous tips if people aren’t comfortable coming forward or using their names. Any information we get is important,” he said.

It was the second act of vandalism involving Northport school buses within the last two weeks. On March 29, someone pulled wires between the engine and transmission on four buses. Wessell said that problem was easily repaired with replaced wires.

Northport keeps its buses at a storage area in the Busby Oil property on M-22 just north of Omena, which Wessell said is not secured by a fence. The district has stored buses at the Busby property for many years and has never been victimized by a major act of vandalism until this week. School officials are considering having security camera installed at the storage area.