Orange School Bus Contractor Quits

About 500 special-education students won’t be catching the bus to school today, the first day of class in the Orange Unified School District, because the district’s private bus contractor suddenly quit Tuesday in a dispute over insurance liability.

School administrators, who scrambled Tuesday to hire 55 temporary bus drivers for the district’s 72 routes, do not anticipate delays for the 4,000 regular-education students who depend on bus service in the 27,000-student district.

Administrators, however, asked parents of special-education students to drive their children to school all week until more bus drivers can be found. Because of their disabilities, the students often require special bus equipment and drivers, officials said.

If parents cannot bring in their special-education children, bus drivers will double their routes to pick them up, according to Supt. Robert L. French.

“We’ve got our [regular] routes covered, no problem,” said French, who noted that special-education parents will be reimbursed for mileage. “Parents will never know the difference.”

The bus snafu, however, tarnishes one of the district’s first attempts at privatization.

As part of an overall strategy to implement what they call the “Republican agenda,” the district’s conservative school board voted 6 to 1 in December 1995 to privatize the district’s aging bus service.

“Well, it’s come back to haunt us and a day before school opens,” said Trustee James Fearns, who cast the lone vote against the privatization proposal. “I knew this was a bad idea from the start.”

But Board President Martin Jacobson defended privatization as an important tool in saving the district sorely needed funds. Jacobson said contracting out for bus services could still save the district as much as $500,000 annually.

“I’m disappointed this particular effort to privatize didn’t work out,” Jacobson said. “It’s still a viable option for the district to pursue.”

One of the board’s chief proponents of privatization, Max Reissmueller, refused to comment on the contract cancellation.

After three months of negotiations, the Santa Barbara Transportation Co. notified school officials Tuesday morning that it was disbanding bus service because the district’s $15-million liability insurance policy failed to cover bus drivers against negligence or willful misconduct.

“It’s a real disappointment,” said Ken Stokes, president of the Goleta-based company, which provides bus services for 11 school districts in California. “But we are a mom-and-pop business and we cannot afford that kind of liability.”

However, school district officials contend that the bus company, which has similar agreements with other school districts regarding insurance, is using the liability issue as an excuse to escape its contract.

“The real problem is they were 32 drivers short,” French said. The company had five months in which to do its hiring, he said, “and they couldn’t do it.”

The contract cancellation surprised district officials, who feverishly conducted interviews and drug and driving tests Tuesday in efforts to hire more bus drivers.

Many of the drivers hastily hired as three-month temporary employees had been terminated by the district when it privatized bus service. Then they went to work for Santa Barbara Transportation and lost those jobs because of a management shake-up in the firm.

“It’s crazy,” said Jeanne Knapp, a district bus driver for two years who was hired by Santa Barbara Transportation, then rehired Tuesday by the district. “From minute to minute, you don’t know who you are working for.”

Many of the bus drivers accepted their old jobs back Tuesday with deep resentment. Many took the temporary jobs, which pay less than $11 an hour plus benefits, only because they were forced by economic circumstance to do so.

“If you heard you just got fired, then someone offered you the same job that day, you’d take the job,” said one bus driver, who asked not to be identified. “Otherwise you’re out of work and you can’t put food on the table.”

Added another bus driver, who also asked not to be identified: “They want us back for 90 days for what? So they can shove us out the door again? We are tired of being used, and we’re angry.”

The district’s trustees are expected to discuss bus services at their next meeting Sept. 12.