District faces driver shortage
By Holly Neumann
With a shortage of bus drivers and the possibility of several retiring, the Iola-Scandinavia School District is looking at using contracted busing services.
“We are in a pickle for our transportation,” said Adam Wolberg, who heads the transportation committee. “Currently, we have six bus routes and maybe four drivers that are looking at retiring.”
He said the district has requested bids and received two from Kobussen and GoRiteWay.
“The biggest thing we asked them for was not for one-year contract, but rather a three years of service, and we got up to a five,” said Wolberg.
All contracting would be for the yellow buses only. Special Education routes, done with a suburban or minivan, are cheaper for the district to keep in house.
The committee’s recommendation was to use Kobussen, which would purchase the districts fleet of buses.
The district can sell the fleet for $72,920, while saving about $63,000 annually by outsourcing its busing services.
“The biggest question was did we exert all effort as a school district in trying to let the community know that we need help with bus drivers,” Wolberg said. “The answer is we did.”
Business Manager Sarah Thiel said this is not a matter of contracting to save money.
“It’s an issue that we don’t have drivers to drive our routes,” she said.
Wolberg agreed.
“If we go this route, it’s going to stay this way,” said Wolberg. “We can’t go back and purchase everything. The bigger obstacle is that we have to have faces behind the wheel to move our kids. If we don’t have that then what do we have?”
Thiel noted that this is a couple-step process that involves a legal process before getting contracts finalized and other pieces in place.
The bus garage was another area of concern.
Kobussen would consider leasing that building from the district.
The board voted unanimously to continue to move forward with negotiations with Kobussen for busing services, with a final decision in March.
The contract would be for three years of service from Kobussen, with the option to extend for two additional years and have the same rates locked in.
Current drivers will have the option to go to Kobussen for the same or better pay, benefits, 401K, sign-on bonus and monthly training.
Referendum funds were allocated for the purchase of two new buses this spring.
“It doesn’t pay to buy buses, if we are going to do this,” said Thiel. “That $180,000 in referendum funds could be used for other referendum projects.”