VALLEY CENTER ? Vandals flattened 38 tires on more than 20 school buses but were unable to force the officials who lead the school district in this south-central Kansas town to call off classes.

Bus drivers discovered the flattened tires Friday morning.

“These were flatter than a pancake,” Valley Center Superintendent Mike Meiers said.

With only a handful of buses without flattened tires, district officials grounded the entire fleet.

“At 5 a.m., that crossed my mind: I’m not going to let them force us to not have school,” Meiers said.

Parents were informed they would need to find alternative transportation for children in the morning. By the time classes dismissed for the afternoon, the district had found tires for the vandalized buses.

The repairs are estimated to total about $10,000 because each tire cost about $265 to replace.

Meiers said someone attempted to flatten three tires on two buses over the weekend, but none of those tires went completely flat. That was not the case Friday.

Locks and fences now limit access to the bus storage area.

“We’ll make it a little more difficult” to break in, said Dennis Tracy, the district’s director of transportation. “It’s all we can do.”