Iowa City schools recommend accepting sole bid from Iowa Central for student transportation

District staff recommended that the Iowa City Community School District accept a sole bid from its current contractor, Iowa Central, to provide student transportation after a request-for-proposals process produced only that single responsive offer.

Adam, district staff leading the RFP process, told the Operations Committee that the district published a full RFP, held an initial meeting attended by three companies and conducted a question-and-answer period. “In the end, we did only end up getting one bid for this service, and it was from Iowa Central, our current provider,” Adam said.

The bid includes an average annual cost increase of about 4.3 percent, staff said, with a larger increase in the 2026–27 school year tied to the provider’s negotiations with its employees. “The cost structure … really reflects a 4 percent, slightly over 4 percent, so like, 4.3 annual increase in cost. The one exception … is the 26–27 school year, which … jumps higher … because that’s also the year that they need to renegotiate their deal with their employees,” Adam said. Committee members noted the district cannot dictate how the provider spends increased revenue from that year.

The RFP required bidders to include an option to scale up electric buses. Under the proposal staff presented, the district would be responsible for building charging infrastructure if it opts to implement electric buses; the provider would identify and pursue potential funding to subsidize implementation. Staff estimated a new diesel bus at about $100,000 and an electric bus about $200,000.

Staff also said the recommendation addresses operational issues arising from the district’s middle-school transition. The contract and proposed routing changes are intended to eliminate duplicative “double loop” routes that have left some middle-school students waiting 30–40 minutes; staff said the change will keep students on buses but alter arrival times. Committee discussion referenced roughly five middle-school shuttle routes and about 65 total routes districtwide.

The committee discussed why only one firm submitted a bid. Staff said two other interested companies — one California-based and one Midwest-based — declined to bid primarily because of capacity and the expense of expanding operations into a new market. One firm sent a notice citing those reasons and asked to be included in future RFPs.

Committee members asked about pay-to-ride seats for families paying for transportation. Staff said the district will set pay-to-ride fees on the board consent agenda for the upcoming year; that fee schedule includes a roughly 4 percent increase in the full pay option, a reduced-price option for qualifying families and free service for students who qualify for free lunch. “We’re actually bound by state law that we can’t — we can never make a profit on our pay-to-ride program,” Adam said.

No formal committee vote on the contract appears in the committee discussion recorded in this session. Staff said they will seek formal approval at the regularly scheduled board meeting at 6 p.m., and asked the committee for feedback in advance of that board action.

The district plans to continue monitoring route efficiency, pay-to-ride capacity and potential future bids; staff invited interested contractors to respond to future RFPs.

Questions about next steps and a separate fine-arts study were noted for future operations meetings.