The company whose student bussing contract in the Esterhazy area is being taken over by the Good Spirit School Division is speaking up.
"We're concerned about the loss of full-time employment for our technicians. We're concerned about the economic impact this will have on the communities we service, because we buy stuff there: we buy trucks in Esterhazy, we buy tires in Langenburg," says Adrian Leister, administrator of Rilling Bus Ltd.
The Lemberg-based company has held the school bussing contract in Esterhazy-the only part of the division still using privately-run buses-since 2004. This fall, the Good Spirit School division will not put the contract back up for tender, opting instead to take over its own bus service in the area as what it believes will be a cost-saving measure.
The $2 million fleet of new buses required to service Esterhazy's 23 routes will be maintained 80 kilometers up the road in Melville rather than locally.
The decision was made on the basis of a study undergone by the division beginning in 2008 which indicated that by handling its own bussing, GSSD could save approximately $67,000 per year over the lowest tenders available in the province.
"We questioned them on why they were making decisions based on 2008 information," says Leister. "Before we met with them in February, they told me that based on current information, there was no savings."
A similar rumor-that the takeover offers no cost savings or even increased costs to the division-has been circulating around Esterhazy since the announcement, fueling protest of the school division's decision.
But it's not true, says GSSD Director of Education Dwayne Reeve. While it's correct that the division-run operation will not save any money over the current contract with Rilling Bus, that contract was negotiated seven years ago and would be up for retender this year. Based on typical current tenders, the school division anticipated a jump in costs.
Rilling Bus Ltd. cannot guarantee that it could offer a comparably low tender in 2011, admits Leister, but it would have liked an opportunity to try.
"We're going to have competitors for that tender, so it doesn't necessarily mean that we're going to be any more costly than we are now. We do have increases, but there's allowances for those increases."
But opening up the tender process would close the door on the school division's option to take over its own bussing should its calculation showing this to be the cheapest option prove correct, says Reeve.
"It wouldn't be fair to the suppliers. If we go through the process of entering into a tender then obviously we want to ensure that we can follow through on that."
Leister is skeptical that the division can provide its own bussing as cheaply as it claims.
"We really question them on how they could add 25-30 buses into their fleet and not have to hire anybody new to service that," he says.
The division plans to shift a Melville employee currently split between technician duties and administrative duties into a full technician role in order to meet the new maintenance demand.
"The administrative work is something that we can absorb elsewhere," says Reeve.
Meanwhile, upset residents continue to contact the offices of the school division and Yorkton This Week.
