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Board approves bus and van purchases and three-year transportation contracts
Summary
The board approved replacement buses and vans and renewed multi-year transportation contracts with local providers while discussing the trade-offs between contractor services and in-house operations.
John Murdoch, transportation lead, presented two Thomas Saf-T-Liner C2 buses to replace vehicles that had reached service life and recommended purchasing them from American Bus Sales for a fiscal impact of $324,120. The board approved the purchase by voice vote.
Staff also recommended purchasing two 12-passenger Sprinter vans (a government-discount purchase from the same vendor) with a fiscal impact of $123,180 to support nontraditional transports (e.g., out-of-county placements, special-education transports). Board members clarified that these vans are not configured as standard school buses (they will arrive white, with a Queen Anne's County Public Schools sticker) and will not use school-bus student-warning stop-arm systems.
The board approved renewal of four transportation-provider contracts (Bay Area Transportation LLC, LS Bus Services Inc., Northern County Exchange LLC and Queen Anne's County Bus Lines LLC) covering routes from Aug. 26, 2025, to June 30, 2028. Renewed contract terms included an hourly rate of $29.16, a mileage rate of $1.84, a $29,000 annual PVA for new buses, a $1,200 administrative fee per route and CPI-based adjustments (December CPI-U for the Baltimore-Columbia-Towson region; annual adjustments min 4%/max 8%).
During discussion board members raised the possibility of studying whether running transportation in-house would be cost-effective over time; representatives in the audience from local bus companies asked for time to have their attorneys review the contract text before signing. Public comment from Raymond Aaron, managing member of Queen Anne's County Bus Line, noted the contractors had not been given an opportunity to review the version posted in board docs until the night before and requested clarification on language before final execution.
