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JK
Top Member
USA
7307 Posts |
 Posted - 11/18/2003 : 1:11:36 PM
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Nov 17 2003
The Beaufort Gazette
SC - The Beaufort County School District's contract with Laidlaw, the company that operates its school buses, expired almost 17 months ago, but the company is hedging about signing a new one that includes penalties for poor performance, district officials say.
Parents, school employees and Beaufort County school board members have expressed concern about students' safety and the overall quality of Laidlaw's service after a rash of problems with bus transportation in southern Beaufort County since school began in August. Problems range from late buses to an unattended bus rolling backward in an elementary school parking lot with students aboard.
New information from the school district this week about its oversight of Laidlaw is adding to board members' anxiety over bus transportation.
Laidlaw currently has no contract with the district. The most recent agreement expired June 30, 2002.
The district drafted a new contract and sent it to Laidlaw, but not until spring 2003, at least eight months after the old one expired.
The new contract proposed by the district calls for Laidlaw to pay penalties for poor performance -- a provision that district officials say has become the sticking point in negotiations with Laidlaw.
Even though the new contract hasn't gone into effect, the district has been paying the company higher fees called for in the new contract since August 2002.
School board members were not aware Laidlaw had not signed the new contract.
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