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With the clock ticking until the first day of school, some Staten Island parents are still wondering how they will get their seventh and eighth graders to class, after the city decided to cancel yellow bus service for about 3,000 Staten Island students as part of budget cuts.

"Can you imagine? We still, up until the day before school -- I have two kids in two different schools, I don't yet know how one is getting [there]," said parent Jen McVey. "They both need to be at the same place at the same time."

Citywide, busing is guaranteed to students only through the sixth grade, but because of Staten Island's transportation challenges, a variance had been granted to all middle schoolers.

The Department of Education said it could no longer afford to bus the seventh and eighth graders, at the cost of just over $1.5 million.

A judge issued a temporary restraining order barring the city from suspending service, but an appellate court ruled last month to remove it.

On Friday, lawyer Ron Castorina, who represents local officials, students and their parents, applied for the order to be reinstated, because he said the ruling did not address the possible danger children could face while traveling to school.

"Now just think of one child getting injured or even killed on their first day of school as they traverse down a path without sidewalks, major thoroughfares with buses and trucks," said Castorina. "It just doesn't seem to me that that rations out, that that makes sense."

Parents say they and their children are caught in a budget battle that is putting the young students in a potentially dangerous situation. They say city officials should remember that safety, not money, comes first.

"Give us the buses, it's simple," said parent Erik Pistek. "You can't put a price on child's safety. We all know there's always a knee-jerk reaction when there's a tragedy. Now we have to do something. Is the mayor going to be held liable for that? I would hope so."

On Friday, the judge said he will make a decision about the restraining order on Tuesday, just one day before classes begin.

The case is set to go to trial September 13, but Castorina asked the judge to move that date up as well.