Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools is experiencing bus driver shortages for routes, and the school district is hoping to navigate them through incentives aimed to recruit more drivers.
There's a higher demand for drivers now since the county is back to in-person learning, CHCCS Director of Transportation Bradley Johnson said. Several changes were made to school schedules last year due to COVID-19, such as alternating in-person and virtual class time.
“There was less demand last year because we weren’t transporting students in a normal fashion,” Johnson said.
He said the shortage is impacting students directly, as current ride times can reach a maximum amount of an hour and 15 minutes. On an average year prior to COVID-19, the maximum ride time was about 45 minutes.
In an effort to recruit more drivers to help alleviate this issue, Johnson said CHCCS released a Bus Drivers Recruitment and Retention Plan to try to recruit 30 new drivers.
Julie Hennis, coordinator of volunteers and partners at CHCCS and marketing strategist for the plan, said the campaign began roughly four weeks ago but was officially approved by the board on Sept. 2. The plan has a marketing budget amounting to $25,000, which will cover community outreach and advertising.
CHCCS spokesperson Andy Jenks said the plan also includes a list of incentives for newly recruited and current drivers alike. Most of the incentives are monetary, with the signing bonus change from $2,000 to $4,000 at the forefront.
Other monetary incentives include increased referral bonuses from $250 to $2,000 for any CHCCS employee who recruits a new driver and a perfect attendance bonus from $500 to $1,000 per semester for drivers.
Jenks also said the plan includes non-monetary incentives, including 40-hour work week opportunities for those wanting to work full time and paid commercial driver's license driver training paid by the district.
