Dozens of new electric school buses are rolling into DeKalb County neighborhoods this month, part of a 75-bus fleet expected to carry about 40,000 children on a typical school day. The buses are being deployed in Stone Mountain, Tucker, and along Buford Highway, replacing diesel models that have long idled through some of the county’s busiest residential corridors.
According to CBS Atlanta, DeKalb County School District received about $30 million from the EPA in 2024 to fund the 75 electric buses, and students are scheduled to begin riding them this month. The 40,000 students who will use the new buses represent roughly one-third of the district’s total bused population, per the same report. DeKalb County School District is Georgia’s third-largest school system, and its overall fleet needs about 700 active buses on a typical school day to move roughly 45,000 of its 91,000 enrolled students, according to 11Alive.
Bernando Brown, the district’s director of student transportation, said the electric buses support clean air and the community, per CBS Atlanta’s report. The district’s bus fleet, which includes more than 1,000 vehicles, currently runs on a mix of diesel, propane, gas, and natural gas models — with 199 propane buses and one natural gas bus already in service, the station notes.
How the Fleet Was Built in Stages
The 75-bus deployment came together incrementally. The DeKalb County Board of Education approved a $9.4 million purchase for an initial 25 electric buses in January 2025, a step Hoodline covered in its earlier electric bus deployment story. The board then reviewed an $18.75 million contract for 50 additional Blue Bird buses in December 2025, according to planning documents cited by WSB-TV. Those same documents establish the East DeKalb Campus and the former site of Hooper Alexander Elementary School as designated maintenance and charging hubs for the electric fleet…