Parents, bus drivers seek answers as Saratoga Elementary Board discusses dissolving transportation district

The Saratoga Elementary School Board had a crowd for its meeting Wednesday night as it discussed potentially dissolving its long-running transportation department in favor of accepting bids from bus providers to serve the district.

Lawyer Kevin Gordon from the Kriha Boucek Law Firm was clear, though: The discussion on Wednesday night’s agenda was a preliminary step in the process of potentially dissolving the transportation department and outsourcing. Nothing was finalized by having the item on the agenda, and the process the school board started would help them come to a decision in the proposal.

The agenda reads as follows: “1. Invitation to bid for student transportation services. 2. Notice of public hearing. 3. Notice of intent to contract. 4. Notice to layoff.”

Gordon said each of these steps is required, with the “notice to layoff” employees being the final step the district has to take at the time of issuing its notice of intent to sign a contract with an outside bus service. If the board were to issue an invitation to bid to provide the school bus services, it would have to hold a public hearing to discuss the bids. This can be done without laying off any current employees.

It would also be a way for the school board to obtain the actual cost of contracting out bus services instead of relying on estimates, according to Saratoga’s Business Manager Ken Miller.

The school board members went back and forth before deciding to table the discussion in favor of gathering more information before its next meeting.

Board President Anne McDonnell said she’s struggling with the difference in the retirement the transportation department employees would receive from the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund and the retirement they’d receive working for an outside company. While employees are legally required to be given open jobs at the outside company if the school district were to contract out the bus services, they would no longer receive their full state pensions.

Tracy Gonzalez said when she started at the school district as a bus driver, she didn’t want the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund money taken out of her account. When she asked,

The school district, Gonzalez said, was right to do that.

“Here I am, 15 years later, and thank God for my IMRF,” Gonzalez said. “Because that’s the only way I was able to make that decision at 55 years old to be able to retire.”

Gonzalez said her phone blew up on Friday with former employees, drivers and monitors telling her of a 2 p.m. optional meeting with Superintendent Ashley Ringler letting the transportation department employees know they were going to discuss outsourcing busing.

“That is a life-changing announcement on your livelihood,” Gonzalez said. “It should have been a mandatory meeting.”

Albert Mills, a current bus driver, said he will not be transferring to whichever bus service contracts out with the school if the district decides to head that direction. He said he thinks most of the drivers with the department feel the same way.

Lisa Leach has worked with the school district for 13 years as a driver, as well as in the lunchroom and as a custodian when she’s needed. She said she works at the school because of the small-town, close family atmosphere and her only retirement plan is the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund. She has years into it, but it’s not enough.

“This is something that’s very important to a lot of us,” Leach said. “This is our only way of retirement, the only plan we have. Some of us are single. You have no other income coming in.”

Michelle Peterson, who lives in the school district, shared information from a Feb. 26, 2024 school board meeting from former Superintendent Kathy Perry’s analysis of the transportation services. Perry’s report is available in the meeting minutes of that meeting here.

“The savings realized by sharing transportation was approximately $16 million overall, compared to the cost that would have been incurred by contracting out for bus service,” reads the meeting minutes. “The cost per mile by sharing transportation is $3.74, compared to $8.15 by a contracted service.”

Peterson said if the district has the funding available to cover the additional cost, it should instead invest those funds into the current drivers and bus monitors by offering higher wages, which would attract more people willing to work for a bus service and alleviate the staffing challenges the department faces.

The board tabled further discussion on contracting out its bus services, with Board Member Phil Wilkinson pointing out that there’s already a labor shortage of teachers and drivers. The labor shortage is hitting everyone, not just drivers, and he doesn’t believe contracting out would fix the school district’s issues, he said.

Saratoga’s transportation also provides bus service for Morris Elementary School and Morris Community High School.