Valley View to Look Into Outsourcing Bus Drivers

 officials, strapped for cash because of a lack of state funding, said they will look into outsourcing bus services to save money.

Gary Grizaffi, the assistant superintendent of administrative services, said the school district could save more than $1 million if it were to seek a private company to run its transportation system.

Valley View school board members are likely to consider offers from various companies before taking final action at their scheduled Dec. 12 meeting.

The district has 192 bus drivers and more than 250 employees who would be affected by such a move.

If the district outsourced its transportation services, all of 255 could face reduction in force notice. Per state law, though, those employees would have to be interviewed by the contracted company and nearly all would be brought back, Grizaffi said. 

"Just about everybody would be offered a job," he said. "Probably 95 to 97 percent of folks would be brought back."

Those rehired would be paid the same as they make now in year one of the three-year contract. But the real savings would come in years two and three, Grizaffi said, when the district would be able to avoid certain costs and fees it normally incurs. 

Any bid made by a private company would be match able by the AFSCME Local 3057, the union that represents the transportation employees, Grizaffi said.

In any case, Grizaffi said it is the district's hope that parents and students feel no change whatsoever in bus services.

In June, Gov. Pat Quinn said he would withhold $52 million in transportation payments so he could instead get the most out of federal Medicaid stimulus funds.

As part of the 2009 stimulus plan, the federal government offered states more Medicaid money if they didn’t decrease Medicaid eligibility and followed certain guidelines. Illinois receives 60 cents from the federal government for every dollar it spends, but that will drop to the pre-stimulus amount of 50 cents for every dollar spent starting next month. So far, the state has received $3.6 billion from the federal government’s stimulus plan.

Quinn said he was using school transportation funding, because the school districts have flexibility in how they spend their general state aid, or GSA. Schools can dip into their GSA to cover the lack of bus money over the summer and fall months, Quinn’s office said, until they are reimbursed for their transportation outlays.

Information from an Illinois Statehouse News article was used in this report.