Board Member Joe Tagliente reiterated a previous suggestion he had made of the last year’s board regarding the ability to save money by using the B.O.E. county bus garage to provide maintenance to county vehicles versus contracting the work out to local repair shops.
“We’ve spent $131,487.32 on maintaining maintenance vehicles and a lot of this money could have been saved,” Tagliente told board members.
“This has been brought up at least three tines in work sessions,” he stated. “I really thought that the board would support that because it would save money, but my suggestion was made during an election year and nothing happened.”
“I continue to get questions from taxpayers and I know our maintenance department can take care of these maintenance jobs,” he said.
Tagliente, who comes to the board with more than ten years of experience in management with the bus garage, said he is qualified to determine what the bus garage is and is not capable of doing.
Tagliente questioned Board of Education Superintendent Steve Pauley regarding instructions that the Board had given Pauley during a work meeting to meet with the director of the bus garage to notify him of his duties and responsibilities.
Tagliente indicated that Pauley was derelict in this instance by not following up with the bus garage staff.
“It was my understanding that Mr. Pauley was to meet with Mr. Eversole and work out a schedule that was never done. There was no ambiguity of his responsibility when it came to servicing the vehicles,” Tagliente said.
According to Tagliente, between Oct. 13 and Oct. 15, five vehicles have failed to report for regular maintenance.
Pauley, in turn, said he was under the impression that he was to intercede if necessary but had given instruction to both the bus garage and the maintenance department. He said that once the schedule is given to Mr. Dolin (with the maintenance department), then the people driving these company vehicles need to take them in for service or call and reschedule it.
As of now, Mr. Eversole, with the bus garage, is authorized to service all maintenance vehicles and school buses and make necessary work to those vehicles, including oil changes and changing filters. The bus garage is not, however, authorized to make any repairs to the vehicles.
Tagliente read a letter written by Mr. Eversole to the members of the Boone County Board of Education, stating, “Some of the vehicles [he has serviced] are unsafe to use.”
The letter goes on to state that the bus garage personnel can continue to provide the high level of maintenance on school buses and maintenance vehicles without needing an additional mechanic to do so.
“It would in no way hamper the work on the buses,” the letter states.
Newly elected Board of Education member Chuck Gibson told the board members that he was informed that many of the vehicles had very high mileage on them.
“There’s 427,000 miles on one of them. How many more miles are we going to put on a vehicle before we take it off the road?” he said, voicing his opinion that the board should invest the money necessary to purchase new vehicles.
Board Member Mark Sumpter also voiced his support of buying new vehicles.
“I say we get new vehicles…get these other ones off the road,” he said.
Board of Education President Bobby Hale jumped in with, “It sounds to me like you’re all agreeing to the same thing.”
Finally, a number of three additional vehicles were necessary – two heavy duty trucks and one van.
Also discussed was the impression some board members had that the maintenance department was supplying their crew with these vehicles to take home during the evenings.
“It just seems to me that we’re supplying the maintenance employees with these vehicles that they take home at night. And we don’t give our teachers any subsidies for driving back and forth in their vehicles,” Hale said.
The purchase of additional maintenance vehicles is up for discussion at the next regularly scheduled board of education meeting, to be held Nov. 18, at 7:00 p.m. at the Conference Room, Operations Complex, Foster.
Contact Joanie Newman at jnewman@coalvalleynews.com or call 304-369-1165.
Post a Comment
