VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — The largest school system in Hampton Roads is gearing up to try to slow down the rate of drivers blowing past school bus stop-arms.

Virginia Beach City Public Schools is switching to the BusPatrol bus-mounted cameras, joining Chesapeake, Newport News, Gloucester and Williamsburg in southeastern Virginia.

Cris Sprouse, a transportation coordinator for VBCPS, said people don’t realize how often drivers pass a stopped bus, nor how dangerous it is.

“One day a child’s going to get killed in Virginia Beach,” he said.

Lorton, Virginia-based BusPatrol said it has agreements with more than 500 school districts in about 20 states.

Stop-arm violations are “an extremely pervasive problem, that is, occurring in every single community across the United States, on a nearly every day basis,” according to BusPatrol president Justin Meyers.

The company sent 10 On Your Side video examples of violators in the four area school systems where it is already established. The drivers go by the stopped school bus — flashing lights and stop arm deployed — as if it isn’t even there.

“I think it’s people being impatient, people not understanding the law,” said Kim Blalock, an elementary school parent in Virginia Beach. “When you see the arm, when you see the flashing lights, you should know to stop.”

Virginia law requires drivers approaching a stopped school bus to come to a stop with rare exceptions.

Recent data shows Virginia appears to be worse than North Carolina. In a survey of bus drivers, for every one stop-arm violator in North Carolina, Virginia drivers reported 2.7 violators.

“So if you extrapolate that out across the school year, it’s about 400,000 illegal passes in Virginia alone,” Meyers said.

Cory Nash, the parent of a Virginia Beach sixth-grader, said that “my main concern is before the buses even get there, and the kids are just hanging out at the corner or wherever the stop’s at, the drivers tend to be a little speedy sometimes.”

What does it cost if you’re caught on camera?

“Can you put a price on a child’s life,” Sprouse said.

“I don’t know if everybody knows there’s a fine,” Blalock said. “But as long as people know that that is the fine for it, I think that’s a good amount.”

Virginia Beach school buses are currently installing BusPatrol cameras over the next several weeks. Sprouse estimates about 40% of the fleet already have them, with completion expected by Feb. 1. Violation notices aren’t going out yet, but the buses are already gathering the data, which Sprouse described as “astounding.”

He said under the old system of bus-mounted cameras, more than 400 Va. Beach drivers were cited for stop-arm violations this past June alone, which isn’t even a full school month.

Meyers said the cameras can get drivers who get caught to downshift on their reckless ways.

“Ninety-two percent of the time nationwide, that driver never commits that violation ever again,” Meyers said.

Before a ticket goes out, the video gets reviewed and verified by a human at two levels at BusPatrol, and only then does the video go to local police.

“The police officers determine whether or not, if they were there, would they issue that ticket, and if the answer is yes, then they issue the ticket,” Meyers said.

Said Nash: “I think it’s a good idea. Kind of hold people responsible, maybe slow down around the kids.”