Address of this page: http://www.geocities.com/fltaxpayer/schools/Tunbridge2.html |
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In Vermont, London based First Student Ryder school bus
contractor Ryder raises busing cost 32%
(property taxes later rose 21%...) |
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"Bus Woes at Local Schools"
Martha Slater 9/28/2000 The Herald of Randolph VT Areas around Tunbridge VT: http://www.ourherald.com/News/2000/0928/Front_Page/f01.html One supervisory union is considering suing for breach of contract and several area towns are reporting horror stories as a result of the purchase of the Bruce Transportation Company and JRB last spring by the First Student Bus Company. Schools in several area towns had buses arriving as much as 45 minutes late last week, and other buses did not run at all, with no advance notice. Added to these problems, is the fact that for several schools, the cost of service is significantly more than it was last year under previous providers. Considering legal action is the Orange-Windsor Supervisory Union, which includes the towns of South Royalton, Tunbridge, Chelsea, and Sharon. Bus services in the district amount to a half million dollars. "We have retained an attorney who is handling our issues with them," said OWSU Superintendent David Potter, "although we haven't gotten as far as filing a formal lawsuit yet." Parents were up in arms at the Tunbridge School Board meeting last week, complaining that many students were as much as 45 minutes late arriving at school, due to having to ride second bus runs. "We're still short a driver," Tunbridge principal Bruce Bellemeur, told the Herald. "I've revamped the bus schedule to cover three routes with two drivers, which results in the students arriving an average of about ten minutes late. It's not great, but it's better than it was. It's made a long day for the ones who are picked up first and dropped off last." LACKED PROMISED SERVICE In addition, Bellemeur said the Tunbridge School contract with First Student specified two- way radios, cell phones, and video cameras were to be installed on their buses, "and that hasn't happened. "Also, one of the buses that they contracted to provide for us was a 35-passenger four-wheel drive bus, but instead, they've provided a 23-passenger four-wheel drive bus for a route that has 29 kids on it. I understand that they're short on drivers, but that's their problem. If you sign a contract to provide something, then you should live up to it." COSTS UP The cost of our bus service has gone up, too. It cost us $52,000 the previous year with JRB, and now it's $69,000 with First Student. That's a 32% increase for covering the same routes." DRIVER SHORTAGE AT WAGES & BENEFITS PAID BY FIRST STUDENT In addition to their Woodstock branch, which runs 82 buses covering 20 towns in central Vermont, First Student has divisions in St. Johnsbury and Fairhaven, Vermont and in Piermont and Lebanon, N.H. Woodstock branch manager, Cheryl Phelps, said the company is hampered by a severe shortage of drivers. "That's our main problem and it's a problem statewide," noted Phelps. "We're doing everything we can to recruit new drivers, but it's hard because driving a school bus is part-time work and most people are looking for full-time jobs." Phelps said First Student will train and make all arrangements for testing drivers, who have to qualify for a Class B Commercial Drivers License with airbrake and passenger endorsements, as well as the state of Vermont's school bus endorsement. Bus drivers must also pass a criminal record check and a drug test. The next clinic is scheduled for Oct. 7 from 8-4:30 p.m. First Student is owned by First Group, with national headquarters in St. Louis, Missouri, and in turn by a parent company in England. "I think they bought out too many companies at once and weren't prepared with enough personnel," said Sharon Principal Lanning Nicoloff,... .....who cited "pay issues, as well as the fact that the two two-hour shifts don't dovetail well with other employment,..... .... and some people are intimidated by the size of the vehicle or the responsibility of driving that number of kids," as some reasons for the current bus driver shortage. Nicoloff said that "by Friday of the first week of school, it became apparent that we would have no driver for our third route, so we began looking for one on our own, but so far have been unsuccessful. During the second week of school, we had to juggle the drivers around. "We're still running every route but the Beaver Meadow and Route 132 run," said Nicoloff, "and the community has been just wonderful in helping to transport the kids. We still have some issues with First Student, but right now, we're keeping our fingers crossed�" PROBLEMS IN SORO South Royalton Principal Shawn Pickett said his school is "still having problems, although they were able to add another driver. We were supposed to have two-way radios on the buses, but they're not there. DOUBLE RUNS AND MISSING DRIVER FOR ATHETICS We've been making do with two double runs so all the kids on the second run are late, and even if we had the required number of drivers for the four runs, we'd still need an additional driver for athletic events." In order to solve that problem, South Royalton has had to hire the Royal Lines bus company to provide buses and Pickett told First Student that South Royalton "will have to recover the extra cost of doing that." Pickett said he thought "it's going to get worse before it gets better, because each time these companies are bought out by a bigger one, there's less competition. I think we'll eventually have to go back to owning our own buses and as far as I'm concerned, the sooner the better. "We might not save any money, but at least we'd know who was driving our kids. The best bus service we ever had was when a local man, Jim Blakeman, owned the buses and took pride in what he did, local drivers who knew all of the kids, and parents who knew who was behind the wheel every day. You used to see a lot of drivers who were dairy farmers. They did their milking chores and then drove a bus to supplement their income, but there are a lot fewer farmers today." WINDSOR-NORTHWEST The OWSU towns are not alone in their annoyance with First Student. The towns of Bethel, Rochester, Hancock and Granville, all members of the Windsor Northwest Supervisory Union, have also been reporting their own troubles with the company. The beginning of the school year in Bethel saw problems with the children being picked up late and many parents had to bring the children to school themselves. "We're still short one bus driver," said Elementary School Principal Tim Mock, "but they've brought in a small van and driven some mini-runs with it to the outskirts of town. We have about 90 miles of back roads in Bethel." Mock told the Herald at the end of last week that "at this point things have gotten better and we have no major complaints." Rochester School principal Ilene Levitt noted that "we had trouble with having no drivers for several of our runs. We had one day where the Hancock bus didn't run at all, we had no morning driver for the RAVC bus and the afternoon driver was very late, plus we had no afternoon driver for the river bus. "We had no advance notice so it was very difficult. Kids had to wait for the driver of the hill bus to finish his run and come back to take them home." Levitt noted that although things had gotten better, there were still occasional problems. WINDSOR NORTHWEST SUPERVISORY Union Superintendent Tom O'Brien said he thought things were "smoothing out" with the bus problems and noted that "I respect the company's efforts. It's not an easy problems to solve." |
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