Maya McFadden file photo
First Student school bus contract on tap for a one-year extension.
The Board of Education signed off on a $30 million temporary fix to make sure that public school students have busing this summer and next school year.
School board members took that vote during a special virtual meeting via Zoom Tuesday. The vote came after the board returned to the negotiation table to look into the New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district’s options with next year’s transportation contract.
At Tuesday’s meeting, the Board of Education voted unanimously to approve one of three extension options presented by school bus contractor First Student.
That school board-approved deal splits the district’s agreement with First Student into two separate contracts: one for special education out-of-town busing, and one for regular and special education in-town busing. It will cost $30.7 million in total, will last from July 1 through next June 30, and will cover 180 days of service. The deal now heads to the Board of Alders for review and a potential final vote.
In May, a majority of the school board members voted down approving a three-year contract with First Student which would have cost a total of $93,646,128.58. It instead decided to extend its current contract for an extra 180 service days starting July 1, to allow the district’s transportation team to redo its RFP/bidding process for the next multiyear contract.
A June 2 memorandum from NHPS Chief of Operations Thomas Lamb said the 180-service-day extension “provides opportunity to further level the playing field among respondents or bidders” during a new RFP process.
Click here to view the memorandum and project contract details.
At the Board’s most recent full meeting, Lamb was charged with meeting with First Student to discuss options around extending the current transportation contract after board members struggled to agree on whether the process was fair, if the district should split its transportation contracts between multiple vendors, and if a more affordable provider is out there.
Lamb sent a memo to the board last week outlining the conversation that occurred between his team and First Student. As a result of returning back to the negotiation table, First Student provided the district with three extension options.
The district currently has two contracts with First Student, one for out-of-town special education buses and the other for in-town regular and special education buses.
The three options presented for the extra 180 days of service proposed using the same contract provisions that are currently in place.
The three options gave the district the opportunity to replace none, half, or all buses currently in its fleet, which has 50 buses aging out. The district and First Student have a contractual agreement to replace vehicles that reach seven years of use.
Lamb recommended that the board approve a contract extension that would be the cheapest option by not replacing any of the 50 vehicles. Next year the district will have an additional fleet of 60 buses that will age out with First Student.
The board’s three options were reflective of maintaining the vehicles or replacing them. The recommendation from Lamb was continuing use of the existing fleet for an eighth year to reduce cost and “level the playing field” when the district goes back out to bid.
“It will provide when we go back out to bid that First Student will need to purchase not only these 50 but an additional 60 that will age out of the fleet next year,” Lamb said.
The proposed extension costs were not based on the district’s previous 340 routes but instead 319 consolidated routes which has been working in recent months. The out-of-town contract has 12 routes.
The first option saw a 8.75 percent increase from the current year totaling to $30,730,883.40. The second option was a 12 percent increase from this year for $31, 649,214.24 and 25 new buses. The third option costed $32,214,378.78 for a 14 percent increase and 50 new buses.
The price increases for each option are due to negotiated wage increases for First Student staff. First student increased in driver wages by 49 percent since 2018 to help recruit and retain drivers.
Increases have also been affected by new annual driver bonuses, worker’s compensation and liability insurance costs doubling since 2018, facility costs increases of 19 percent which includes additional security to prevent catalytic converter thefts, increases in the price of buses costing 15 percent more since last fiscal year, and maintenance and labor expenses increasing by 44 percent due to increasing wages.
Lamb also noted that a typical Type C (large yellow school bus) has increased from $83,000 to $95,000 recently.
Lamb added that he negotiated with First Student on the cost of its three options and got them to reduce option one’s total cost by 1 percent.
He said a new RFP process will begin as soon as possible, likely when coming superintendent Madeline Negron starts.
Board of Education President Yesenia Rivera asked if the board should expect any change orders in the near future related to the contract extension. Lamb said no.
Vice President Matt Wilcox clarified that the temporary contract extension will not address any of the board’s planned climate fixes and will delay them yet another year.
“I’m unfortunately going to have to be in support of this, you know the option one even though I do want to point out that we’re going to spend $989,019.80 more than we would have spent and we’re going to get it looks like 2.4 million less in services,” Wilcox said.
Wilcox and Board member Edward Joyner shared frustrations with starting the bidding process over again despite the first RFP bringing “competition and viable bidders,” a unanimous choice by transportation experts, and support from transportation consultant Bonfire throughout the entire process.
“Quite frankly this process should have started earlier,” Goldson said in opposition to fellow members applauding the first bid process. “It was stopped several times because one of two key people were out or sick or whatever the excuses were and in the end of the day it ended up being the same kind of process that we’ve had in the past and that is a choice is given to us too close to the start of the new year without us being able to correct some of the issues that the majority of the board members through were correctable.”
Wilcox added that the previous contract passed up by the board had new vehicles worked into it. But now the district will have to instead maintain the older buses and those older buses may put out more exhaust fumes he said.