School bus driver shortage straining Lexington 1, other SC school districts

For 35 years, I’ve worked in school bus transportation. I’ve served as the transportation director for Lexington 1 for the last five years. In those three decades, I have never seen a school bus driver shortage, nor issues caused by the shortage, this severe.

I’m not saying this as an excuse, but all South Carolina school districts, as well as schools across the nation, are facing a critical shortage of drivers. It seems to be getting worse.

From our district’s perspective, our transportation staff and drivers are giving everything they have to complete our routes. However, each day throws them new challenges. The pandemic and the driver shortage creates extra stress and frustration.

As of Sept. 23, we’re down 38 drivers and another 11 are absent because of COVID-19 and other health related issues.

School bus drivers are dedicated and desire to do an excellent job. Our current situation makes it hard to provide the quality of service we truly want to give our families. For this, I am sorry.

Over the past weeks, we’ve heard some negative – and sometimes cruel – comments. Please remember that none of us want to work with these pandemic conditions or shortages. But the fact of the matter is, we must.

Negative comments from the public only make the situation worse. Recently, some people have resigned because of the negativity and stress. Those resignations led me to write this letter.

Please, we cannot afford to lose any more employees – our situation is critical enough as is. More importantly, our people deserve better. They matter.

These are not ideal times, and we ask for your understanding as we try to best serve our students and improve this situation.

Allow me to answer a few questions I’ve received recently.

Can we go back to using student bus drivers? In 1988, the U.S. Department of Labor mandated South Carolina cease using student drivers. Additionally, a driver must be 18 years old to hold a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) which is a requirement for bus drivers.

Why don’t you use coaches or teachers to drive? Our schools are short staffed also, so these educators are needed in the classroom. They are handling school duties or coaching before or after school when drivers would be needed to work

Why didn’t you anticipate this issue and hire people sooner? For years, we’ve consistently worked to hire drivers, but struggle to get applicants. This summer, Lexington District One increased driver starting pay from $14.05 to $15.75 and our top rate of pay is now $31.69 an hour. But, we are still not seeing a large number of applicants.

In fact, everywhere you look, people are hiring and not having much luck.

We do want to improve our services to families, but we need your help and understanding during these challenging times.

We truly do have wonderful people working in school bus transportation.

This story was originally published September 30, 2021 at 9:30 AM.