“We want to be working, not walking.” School bus drivers strike

Families in the Mat-Su Borough continued without school bus service while extra-long lines at school drop-offs snaked onto side streets as school bus drivers remained on the picket lines this past week.

“All of the issues with the contractor this year, with the (rolling bus service) blackouts, with the safety, the on-time percentage, all of that is the district’s problem. It’s their contract. The contract’s only as good as the person ensuring the provisions are being followed,” said Teamster 959 representative Kelsey Taylor on Wednesday morning as drivers picketed outside of the Durham Bus Yard in Wasilla. Another group could be seen closer to Parks Highway as drivers honked their support of the strike.

Safety remains the top issue that needs to be addressed as drivers and monitors shared stories of inadequate facilities at the bus yard with little lighting, inadequate parking for the staff, and failure to properly equip buses to meet the needs of the weather, and the students.

Drivers shared stories of heaters not heating all the spaces in the bus, external speaker systems not working, and special education buses not having adequate equipment to assist with students who have mobility issues, and special education drivers and attendants not being properly trained.

“When the wheelchair lift goes on out these buses, there’s an audible alarm that goes off. I’ve had members with an app on their phone record it, and it’s over 100 decibels,” said Taylor. For students with special needs, their hearing can be sensitive and may require hearing protection to muffle the sound.

“We’ve literally had kids hunched down, trying to cover their ears,” he said, adding that he was certain every single special education bus driver or attendant has had multiple conversations trying to address the issue.

“We’re required to have heat on our buses, and there’s no heat. Another driver kept calling in saying she had no heat, but she was told to keep driving. It was 15 degrees (on Tuesday),” recalled Bell, as other drivers concurred with his statement.

“It’s a contractual requirement that there’s a certain number of spare, ready to go buses, 1 bus for every 10 is supposed to have a spare, operational bus. That’s something the district could lean on, especially because we’ve got too many buses that aren’t fixed. Instead they’re driving broken buses.”

Another complaint the drivers repeatedly voiced were that there were buses were either late or missing routes altogether due to an apparent lack of communication, something some drivers say is because radios are not always working, while others say it is mismanagement.

“Daily they forget to send buses to pick up kids. Daily,” said bus driver Mike Warriner. “When I walked in and asked, ‘did you put somebody on that route?’ I got on that route, and by the time I picked up the kids, they’d been standing out there for an hour in the cold.”

He went on to explain that drivers are not assigned the same routes, and that some drivers are put on random routes, and that there are times the dispatcher and safety officers have had to step in and drive the buses.

“The dispatch guy was driving a bus while trying to dispatch from the bus,” said fellow bus driver Larry Russell.

When asked why the drivers walked off in the middle of a school day, leaving many parents scrambling to find transportation alternatives, Taylor said that “We know any labor action is going to cause a big inconvenience to the community, but we weren’t willing to sacrifice the children’s safety.”

During the regularly scheduled Matanuska Susitna Borough School District (MSBSD) school board meeting on Wednesday evening, drivers and attendants packed the meeting to testify and show support for the striking bus drivers, many of whom repeated the stories of repeated safety violations and lack of communication.

“We stand in support of the bus drivers,” Vicki Hewitt, President of the Mat-Su Education Association, told the MSBSD school board.

“This new mess is just one more stain on the bus coverage that Durham has provided for our district. Since Durham has not provided the necessary tools for the bus drivers to do their job, Durham has not been able to fulfill their end of the bargain,” she said, citing problems at the beginning of the school year when educators were tasked with riding along with students to ensure safety and lack of full bus service.

David Bell, a retired Air Force Master Sergeant who has been driving school buses for 6 years told the school board that the situation with Durham has had him considering leaving his job.

“It breaks my heart to consider quitting, but I’ve considered it,” he said, adding “that after 3 days of scheduled talks, they are not serious about supporting us. We need your help.”

Indeed, many drivers asked the MSBSD school board for help, citing that MSBSD has often called upon the drivers to be a positive influence.

“We feel disregarded and disrespected. We’re not in it for the riches,” stated Dennis Little, a bus driver for 26 years. “You’ve asked us to be the positive adult influence. We’re told we matter by you, but we’re told by this company that we don’t.”

Taylor spoke again at the meeting, asking the school board to hold Durham accountable.

“The contract has many provisions that would ensure better service and accountability from Durham, but the feeling from employees is that no one cares,” he told the board.

He went on to say that the problems are unheard of and unacceptable.

“The school board approved this contractor and approved this contract. The board has the responsibility to ensure that Durham follows all the provisions of the agreement.”

Taylor also told the board that nobody wanted to take a strike, but felt that there was no support from the board or administration to solve the ongoing issues with Durham.

MSBSD Superintendent Dr. Randy Trani did address the strike, specifically how Durham was awarded the contract last year.

“Durham is the new provider for the 43 schools in the core area. The idea that we picked the lowest bidder, it (Durham) was the only bidder,” Dr. Trani said. He also encouraged board members, as well as community members to read over the contract with Durham to make sure that they are meeting the requirements of the contract.

It was also brought up that if the school board felt that Durham was not meeting the terms of the contract, legal counsel would have to be called in

Other board members said that it is not the board’s position to debate the contract,

“We have nothing to do with this contract. Our attorneys are not going to get involved in it and we’re not going to,” said school board member Ole Larson. He went on to say that the meeting was not the place to debate whether or not to get involved in the contract. “This is between the teamsters and this is between Durham.”

The school board does oversee the contract, but did not entertain hypotheticals pertaining to the possibility of canceling the contract.

“I think everybody in the room would agree that strikes are not good for students or their families, or for the people involved, and that’s why we’re doing all we can to encourage a quick solution to this problem, to ratify a fair and equitable contract,” said Dr. Trani.

In a statement from National Express, the company that oversees Durham Bus Services, they say that they have addressed the safety concerns, stating lights had been utilized to illuminate the yard, block heaters have been ordered but are hung up due to supply chain problems, and that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration found the facility to be in compliance after a review back in October.

They went on to say that the union has ignored requests for negotiations, denied company requests to utilize a federal mediator, and that it “took a break to review the company’s final offer and never came back” on Jan. 30.

Several drivers speaking at the meeting said that at one point, a negotiator on the phone had to excuse themselves because “my dog ate my negotiation paperwork,” before ignoring the union for 3 weeks.

Union representatives also said that when Durham was told the drivers had gone on strike, “they hung up the phone.”

“We welcome all employees who want to come to work and not engage in this strike,” the statement read. “Additionally, we stand ready to meet with the Union at any time to resume bargaining and negotiate a new contract. We want to end this disruption to our service as soon as possible.”

Teamsters Local 959, wanting to settle the labor dispute, did reach out to Durham and are scheduled to return to the bargaining table beginning Friday morning.