The Clark County School District’s transportation department’s roster of bus drivers is depleted, which is causing havoc for children who ride a school bus daily and their parents.
Friday, March 18, 2022 | 2 a.m.
The Clark County School District is increasing bus driver wages by more than 40% in a bid to retain, attract and maybe even win back drivers.
Effective immediately, hourly pay will increase from $15.36-$19.98 per hour, depending on experience and assignment, to $21.67-$29.04 per hour, with experienced drivers of special education students making the most. The increase is for new hires and current employees.
The district is down about 250 drivers — it would be fully staffed at about 1,500 but only has about 1,250. Some buses have come hours late, if at all. Officials hope the pay raise will fill the vacancies before the next school year.
The increase, funded through CCSD’s general operating budget, came after the district confirmed that its front-line transportation pay wasn't competitive with similar jobs in the area, said Jennifer Vobis, CCSD’s executive director of transportation.
Superintendent Jesus Jara referenced the raises in his annual State of the Schools address this month. Since then, Vobis said, she’s heard anecdotally that drivers who took other jobs are coming back. One driver who put in two weeks’ notice rescinded it upon hearing about the raises.
Driving a yellow bus is a complex, demanding job, Vobis said. Drivers need specialized training, a commercial driver’s license with additional endorsements, and clean background checks. There’s also the pressure of carrying the equivalent of two classrooms full of children in thick city traffic.
“There’s a lot of responsibility in that job,” she said. “I think (the new pay range) reflects more of what the position is.”
Latrice McCallon drives students with special needs. A single mom whose day can start before 5 a.m., she said she loves working with children and treats all her passengers like her own child, who also rides a bus to school.
“That brings me joy to know that I’m getting them to school and I’m getting them home safely,” she said.
She’s willing to work hard to get every child to school without making them wait. But she said it’s about time pay increased in the transportation department.
District traffic instructors and investigators will also see a hike.
Lawrence Turner, an investigator, follows up on collisions and complaints involving school vehicles. He’s worked for CCSD for 15 years, the last six of those as a civilian traffic investigator and the first nine as a driver. All investigators started as drivers, and he still drives a bus when needed. It was needed as recently as this week.
The transportation department has been under a pay freeze for eight or nine years, he said, so the raises are “long overdue.”
“We definitely hope that it boosts the morale of the existing drivers and it becomes competitive so that we can get more drivers in this shortage,” Turner said.
The raises are the latest attempt to address the driver shortage, a pandemic-exacerbated problem seen in schools nationwide.
Within the past year, the district approved recruitment and retention bonuses for drivers, in addition to $2,000 bonuses for all CCSD employees who worked during the coronavirus pandemic. CCSD has consolidated some bus routes, tweaked some school bell times and dropped several high school routes and given the displaced riders passes for public buses. It's also rescheduled some athletic matches and canceled rides to off-campus after-school sports practices.
School administrators will go ahead with their plan to shift more start and end times districtwide next year, standardizing them by elementary, middle and high school levels so one driver can run routes for three schools. That’s an operational efficiency that makes sense to keep, Vobis said.
“Student academic success is enhanced when we can provide timely arrivals and departures,” Jara said in a statement. “Our employees are our greatest asset, so we worked with the respective bargaining unit to develop this solution to position the district as a career choice and an attractive option for those looking to work in transportation.”
