Two Clay County Public Schools bus drivers described the hardships they and their colleagues endure, including abuse from parents and increased workloads due to a driver shortage.
During their November meeting, bus driver Carol Green told school board members that the last school year was a “nightmare” for the district’s transportation workers, and she sees this year heading in the same direction.
“We were humiliated on social media and verbally abused at bus (stops),” the employee with 26 years of service said, “but we still had to smile.”
Green said that so far this school year, 30 drivers have quit. She also noted that the district has yet to discuss pay raises for bus operators and that in the past, some drivers have been rewarded with significant pay increases while others have gotten as little as 5 cents-an-hour raises.
Another driver, Kristen Taylor, told the board she has been driving for nine years and that even with adding field trips, spraying busses during the pandemic, and working summers cleaning busses, she has to rely on food assistance from the government.
Taylor also said the district offered a $500 incentive program for workers to recruit drivers. She said she recruited a friend and that the friend recruited another person.
“I never got the bonus check,” she said. “Nor did my friend and I never got a callback.”
Taylor said she heard from a reliable source that the program was never funded.
Superintendent David Broskie acknowledged the driver’s complaints and said the district is addressing them.
“We hear you,” he said, adding that the next bargaining session with the bus drivers’ union was scheduled for the Monday following the school board meeting.
