Superintendent Asks for Patience as they Deal With Bus Driver Shortage

On Tuesday, Liberty Union High School District Superintendent Eric Volta urged patience from the community as they deal with a bus driver shortage.

According to Volta, they were fully staffed coming back from summer break, but they have lost a number of drivers prior to the second week of school. No details or reasons were provided.

Volta said Tuesday that the District has 27 bus driver positions and they were down 8 drivers due to retirement, injury or resignation.

“Over the past few years, even before the pandemic it has been a challenge. Prior to this year, we never had to send home notices to parents that routes were cancelled,” said Volta.

Here is the letter he sent out:

Dear Transportation Parents,

I would first of all like to thank and acknowledge the herculean efforts of our transportation office and its employees. As you may be aware there is a national shortage of bus drivers. When we came back from summer break we were fully staffed, with drivers in the pipeline to be trained.

Unfortunately, due to numerous reasons, we lost a number of drivers prior to the second week of school. Our trainers are now covering routes and our progress training new drivers has slowed. We ask for your patience as the East County Transportation Consortium (Brentwood, Byron, Liberty, and Oakley) works diligently to resolve the issues we are having with our routing due to the shortage of eight drivers. In an effort to make the routes timelier we ask your assistance in working with your student to abide by all rules while on the bus. Many times, due to safety concerns drivers will stop a bus to address a disruption.

In the future, to get students to school on time the consortium may need to:

• • Create earlier pickup times
  • Consolidate bus stops 
  • Cancel certain general education routes to fill mandated special services routes
  • Make two trips to brings students to school albeit a little late. 
  • Extend the distance from school transportation service areas.

It should be noted that the East County Transportation Consortium is one of the last few school bus services still offering general education transportation service in the county. We have contacted outside agencies to possibly provide additional drivers, however if our situation worsens we may have to cancel some of our shorter, lower ridership routes.

We are ultimately at the mercy of the number of drivers available on any given day. If you are, or know someone that may be interested in a district bus driver position you can find the job posting at: https://www.edjoin.org/Home/DistrictJobPosting/1770289 . 

All district positions are eligible for the State Retirement System enrollment and medical benefits. If you would like more information about driving please call our HR department at 634-2166 ext. 2027.

I truly am sorry that this may be a little unsettling as we start the new school year. I promise we are working to resolve the issues.
 
Sincerely,
Eric L. Volta

The Brentwood Union Elementary School District sent out notices Tuesday about routes also being cancelled due to a bus driver shortage.