In order to save money, Living Sky School Division is down to one contracted school bus service rather than two.
First Student will now be the only contracted bus service. Southland Transportation will no longer be.
Living Sky board chair Ronna Pethick said the decision shouldn’t affect students’ parents and there are no plans for rerouting.
Southland Transportation General Manager Kyle Johnston said it “was just a matter of the lowest bidder,” although the decision could locally affect Southland in a negative way.
Light of Christ Catholic Schools, along with Living Sky, are both no longer using Southland, and approximately 26 Southland staff could be laid off, Johnston said. But Johnston said former staff could have the opportunity to apply to drive the routes they drove with Southland.
Southland will continue to provide busing for the schooling organizations with whom they have pre-existing contracts, including francophone and First Nation schools.
Johnston said the local facility will remain and Southland will continue to support the community.
“We hope eventually our service will prevail and we can earn our contracts back,” Johnston said.
City Busing
The News-Optimist was recently contacted by a parent who lived within one kilometre of the North Battleford Comprehensive High School. The parent was concerned her daughter, among other things, had to walk through a potentially dangerous area in the city, and didn’t want her walking to school in very cold weather.
The parent said she heard from other parents who were willing to pay for more busing in urban areas.
Pethick said parents have the option to get their own busing system. But fees would be considerably more than what parents were previously paying.
Regarding the board’s approach to busing decisions, Pethick said “the dilemma for the board would be, ‘what about the people who can’t pay?’”
