Ann Arbor school board approves bus consolidation

The Ann Arbor school board gave its final approval Wednesday to joining a countywide transportation plan.

The move means at least four districts will consolidate their general education and special education busing into one entity to be run by the Washtenaw Intermediate School District, officials said.

The Ann Arbor school district plans to join the countywide transportation system.

It also means all of Ann Arbor's bus drivers and other employees in the transportation division will be laid off. They will be allowed to reapply for jobs with the new organization.

Other districts joining the countywide system are Willow Run, Ypsilanti, Lincoln and Whitmore Lake.

WISD officials have said they want to hire as many employees as possible, but they haven't promised anyone a job. Bus drivers who are hired will take cuts in pay and have to pay more for health insurance.

The move will save the Ann Arbor school district more than $1 million in the first school year, officials project.

School board President Deb Mexicotte said the board had several options to get savings in transportation. Board members have said they preferred this approach to privatizing because the employees would stay eligible for the same government workers' retirement plan.

“Doing nothing in a year when we have a $20 million budget deficit wasn’t an option,” Mexicotte said. “We’ve been talking about everyone making sacrifices.”

She said the board also recognized that without Ann Arbor - the county’s largest district - joining the plan, it would have been hard to do. That would have impacted the budgets of smaller districts facing steep budget holes, she said.

“We felt we needed to be a good partner to the other districts in the county. We understood we had to be leaders in this.”

David Jesse covers K-12 education for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidjesse@annarbor.com or at 734-623-2534.