Countywide : Managers to Get Pay for Work During Bus Strike

Without debate, Orange County Transit District directors voted unanimously Monday to award $15,000 in overtime pay to administrators who drove buses and performed other duties during December’s bus drivers’ strike.

Administrators are considered management employees who are normally excluded from overtime pay, OCTD officials said.

The overtime money will go to 15 supervisors, schedulers and analysts. Most drove buses for between six and 80 hours during the 14-day walkout. Each administrator involved will receive between $105 and $1,392 based on straight time and not time and a half, OCTD spokeswoman Joanne Curran said.

OTCD directors also moved Monday to boost flagging ridership.

Faced with a 10% loss in ridership since December’s strike, the directors declared March 6 a “free fare day.”

On that day, the standard 75-cent bus fare on OCTD’s regular, fixed routes will be waived in an effort to increase ridership above pre-strike levels.

OCTD spokeswoman Claudia Keith said the district has been losing about 10% of its regular fare box revenues of $40,000 to $50,000 per day since the 14-day walkout.

Keith said the “free fare day” will be coupled with a neighborhood-by-neighborhood advertising campaign to faamiliarize residential areas with specific bus routes that can be used to get to major employment centers.

But in other action, transit agency officials voted unanimously to double parking fees at OCTD’s Santa Ana Transit Terminal in a bid to match increased parking rates elsewhere in the civic center.

The terminal serves as a regional hub for OCTD bus service and is located across the street from the county Hall of Administration.

Effective March 1, the hourly rate will increase from 50 cents to $1; the maximum daily charge will go from $2.50 to $5, and the monthly rate will rise from $20 to $35.

OCTD board member Don R. Roth, who is also a county supervisor, warned that the fee hikes might discourage people from participating in OCTD’s Park-and-Ride program, but he voted for the increases after OCTD staff members explained that eventually the Park-and-Ride program will reserve some of the 480 spaces in the transit center’s parking structure for participants.