Action Alerts

Bring electric school buses to Washington

What's At Stake

Update 3/1/24: Thanks in part to nearly 1,000 Earthjustice supporters and clean air champions in the Washington Legislature, the bill to accelerate our transition to electric, zero emissions school buses passed both the House and Senate and is headed to Governor Inslee’s desk.  

We thank Rep. Tana Senn, prime sponsor of the bill, for her steadfast leadership on this effort that we believe will increase student health and social outcomes, while transitioning our school fleets away from fossil fuels to clean energy. 

We still need to finish the job. Join us in urging Governor Inslee to sign the bill into law. 

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We are asking for $80 million from the Climate Commitment Act for helping school districts buy electric school buses, but we need the legislature to pass a bill that would set requirements for how the funds are spent and ensure a transition to 100% clean school buses. 

We worked to successfully include an important provision in the bill that will provide the maximum benefit for schoolchildren and communities across the state. 

The policy will prioritize money for school districts where kids are already breathing dirty air and riding older, more polluting buses. Diesel exhaust produces some of the dirtiest, most toxic pollution in existence that fouls the air in our neighborhoods and directly hurts kids riding in diesel buses. Replacing diesel buses with clean, electric buses is a meaningful step toward addressing decades of policy that has intentionally concentrated transportation pollution in low-income communities and communities of color. 

House Bill 1368 is Washington’s chance to lead the nation in the transition to electric school buses. Tell the Governor to sign the bill.

Illustration of youth standing in parking lot in front of a yellow electric school bus. One youth is waving to the bus driver.
Electric school buses would benefit the 25 million school children who ride the bus to school every day in the United States. (Neal Sharp for Earthjustice)

Delivery to Washington Governor Jay Inslee

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Your Actions Matter

Your messages make a difference, even if we have leaders who don't want to listen. Here's why.

You level the playing field.

Elected officials pay attention when they see that we are paying attention. Read more.

They may be hearing from industry lobbyists left and right, but hearing the stories of their constituents — that’s your power.

Our legislators serve at the pleasure of the people who gave them their job — you.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. When you contact your elected official, you’re putting a face and a name on an issue.

Whether or not you voted for them, they work for you, for the duration of their term.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. (Find your local, state, and federal elected officials.)

Your action is with us in court.

If a federal agency finalizes a harmful action, the record of public comments provides a basis for bringing them into court. Read more.

Throughout each of the public comment periods we alert you to, Earthjustice’s attorneys are researching and writing in-depth, technical comments to submit — detailing how the regulation could and should be stronger to protect the environment, our communities, and our planet.

We need you to join us — your specific experiences, knowledge, and voice are crucial to add to the Administrative Record through the comment periods.

Lawsuits we file that challenge weak or harmful federal regulations rely on what was submitted during the comment period. The court can only look at documents that are in the Administrative Record — including the public comments — to decide if the agency did something improper.

Your actions aid our litigation. Taking action and submitting comments during a comment period is substantively important.

It’s the law.

Federal agencies must pause what they’re doing and ask for — and consider — your comment. Read more.

Many of us may have never heard of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), but laws like these require our government to ask the public to weigh in before agencies adopt or change regulations.

Regulations essentially describe how federal agencies will carry out laws — including decisions that could undermine science, or weaken safeguards on public health.

Public comments are collected at various points throughout the federal government’s rulemaking process, including when a regulation is proposed and finalized. (Learn about the rulemaking process.) These comments become part of the official, legal public record — the “Administrative Record.”

When the public responds with a huge outpouring of support for environmental protections, these individual messages collectively undercut politicians' attempts to claim otherwise.

What this means is each of us can take a role in shaping the rules our government creates — and ensuring those rules are fair and effective.