Superintendent: Westport bus fix carries ‘inevitable’ consequences

“These additional drivers will help mitigate the driver shortage, but additional measures will need to be taken in the interim as the process of licensing can take an extended period of time.” Superintendent Thomas Scarice

WESTPORT — Transportation continues to be an issue for the Westport Public Schools. With reliability and consistency becoming even bigger problems, the school has decided to condense some of the bus routes, said Superintendent Thomas Scarice.

What started off as concerns about drop off times at the elementary level has gradually evolved to impact all levels, Scarice said. Due to the bus driver shortage, increased town traffic and delayed bus returns, Westport has been looking for solutions to help the problem, he said.

“There are a number of short-term measures that are being put in place to mitigate the impact of the driver shortage,” Scarice said. “However, each of these solutions, while providing increased reliability and consistency, will result in unintended, but inevitable, consequences.”

Since the start of the year, Dattco, Westport’s transportation provider, has lost nine drivers, a dispatcher and the operations supervisor, according to Scarice. The driver shortages caused several problems in the district and ultimately led to Dattco reallocating staff from other locations to assign more people to Westport. Now, Westport plans to reduce the number of bus routes from 57 to 51.

The condensed routes will require six fewer drivers. Scarice said the change would “significantly improve” Dattco’s ability to reliably staff Westport’s buses on a daily basis. Once a full roster of drivers are stabilized, the school will consider returning to the original routes. But that is not expected to happen for months.

The consolidated routes, though, will mean more students on each bus, and longer routes.

“This is not desirable, particularly given our successful mitigation efforts with COVID on our buses and in our classrooms,” Scarice said. But he added that “providing reliable and consistent service is our priority at the present time.”

Currently, Dattco has 13 new drivers in training who will begin driving in Westport when they receive their CDL. Six of these candidates are currently only awaiting their comprehensive background check and clearance, according to company officials.

“These additional drivers will help mitigate the driver shortage, but additional measures will need to be taken in the interim as the process of licensing can take an extended period of time,” Scarice said.

In addition, the district has also reached out to local first responders to determine if some were able to assist in driving buses. But due to their inconsistent schedules, they did not provide a reliable solution, he said.

While permanently condensing bus routes and adding new drivers are currently the district’s main mitigating measures to fix their reliability and consistency issues, Scarice said that if those measures don’t resolve the problem, the district would need to consider other solutions, including community bus stops and creating more time between bus tiers

The community bus stop would have buses pick up students from multiple stops at a central location.

“Less stops with the same total number of students on a bus allows for increased drive time and quicker arrivals,” Scarice said.

Currently, the district provides for 30 minutes between each of the three tiers. Increasing the time between tiers would only be considered if all other interventions fail to provide the necessary reliability and consistency in pick up and drop off times, Scarice said.