July 6, 2010 — Albany, NY, Andre Claridge, government relations representative for the New York School Bus Contractors Association (NYSBCA), released a summary of this year’s progress on a number of legislative and budget issues important to NYSBCA and the school bus contractor industry.
“We made solid progress on a number of issues this year including stopping the Governor’s efforts to allow school districts to engage in district-operated regional transportation services and contract piggybacking, said Claridge. “We were also able to get school bus contractors included in a bill being pushed by school districts and the legislature that allows SED to administer a pilot project to study and assist school districts in forming regional transportation systems.”
Excerpt from a summary of this year’s government relations and lobbying efforts:
District Operated-Regional Transportation and Contract Piggybacking:
Governor Paterson’s budget proposal called for district-operated regional transportation and contract piggybacking.
Lobbying efforts were able to convince the legislature to agree to remove all of Governor Paterson’s budget language that would allow school districts to engage in school district-operated regionalization and contract piggybacking.
State Education Department’s Regional Transportation Pilot Project
Governor Paterson’s budget proposal, which we got removed from the final budget, called for the creation of a pilot project at SED to assist school districts in the formation of regional transportation systems including, but not limited to joint services with other school districts and boards of cooperative educational services. The original language also did not specifically allow school bus contractors to participate in the pilot project process.
Although the language was removed from the budget, the legislature in cooperation with the Governor’s office introduced a separate bill that would create the pilot project.
Lobbying efforts convinced the legislature that it was critical for the budget and/or any legislation pertaining to a regional transportation pilot program to specifically include school bus contractors to ensure the industry’s positions on these controversial issues are heard and ultimately incorporated in any potential recommendation to the Governor and Legislature.
The bill (S.8376 by Senator Oppenheimer same as A.11566 by Nolan) was passed by both houses and it included “pupil transportation contractors” in the list of pilot project participants
Transportation Funding:
The Governor, the Senate and Assembly agreed to continue the current law funding in the amount of $1.64 billion, which is an increase of $99.6 million or 6.4 percent over SY 2009-2010.
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