Proposed Student Transportation Agreement
Student Transportation Agreement
October 27, 2011
This agreement (hereafter referred to as the “Contract”) for Student Transportation Services (hereafter “Transportation”) between St. Joseph School District (hereafter the “District”) and ______(hereafter the “Contractor”) is entered into effective the 1st day of July in the year 2012.
1) General Provisions
A) Term: Initial Term of Contract: July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2015, a period of three years.
B) Option to Extend: This agreement can be extended at the option of the District for a period of two (2) one year periods at the same terms and conditions of the initial agreement.
C) Assignment: Contractor shall not assign or subcontract performance of this Contract without the written consent of the District.
D) Entirety of Agreement: The provisions of this Contract encompass the entire agreement between the two parties. No modification, addition or deletion to this Contract shall be effective unless placed in writing and signed by the parties hereto. This Contract shall supersede all prior agreements between the parties with respect to the subject matter hereof.
E) Modifications, Amendments and Guidelines: The District may from time to time require modifications to the scope of services performed by the Contractor. Such changes will be negotiated between the District and the Contractor, and may result in Contractor compensation increases or decreases. Confirmed changes may be incorporated by written amendments to the agreement. The District shall have discretionary authority to issue guidelines to the Contractor that define the policies, procedures, and preferences of the District.
F) Severability for Cause: The District may terminate this Contract for cause with 60 days written notice. Cause is defined as the Contractor’s failure to achieve or comply with the Minimum Service Level Criteria for any two consecutive months after being notified in writing by the District of the failure or non-compliance matter.
G) Force Majeure: In the event the Contractor is unable to provide Transportation because of acts of God, fire, riot, war, strikes or labor disputes, the District may excuse the Contractor from performance of all or a portion of the Transportation. If the Contractor is unable to perform, the District will have the right to operate any buses the Contractor is prevented from operating with such employees or persons the District may deem appropriate. Compensation will be terminated or otherwise adjusted until the Contractor can resume full operations.
H) Records, Reports & Audits: Contractor shall maintain such records and submit such reports to meet state reporting and district recordkeeping requirements, and provide such for review and audit when requested by authorities or the District.
I) Missouri Contract: This contract and provisions contained herein shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the state of Missouri.
2) Transportation Requirements
A) Legal Compliance
i) The Contractor will comply with all applicable national, state, county, municipal, or local laws, statutes, ordinances, regulations, and/or prohibitions pertaining to its corporate administrative and operational matters and providing Transportation for and in the District.
ii) This compliance includes all aspects of Transportation including, but not limited to, school buses and related vehicles, school bus equipment, school bus licensing, employee training, employee certification, driver licensing, background checks, drug and alcohol testing, first aid certification, emergency preparedness, environmental, fueling, traffic and parking ordinances, etc.
iii) The Contractor is fully responsible for having full knowledge of all such laws, statutes, ordinances, Board of Education and District policies, and any District administrative guidelines.
B) Transportation Programs & Types
i) The Contractor will provide, at a minimum, home to school and school to home service for all regular education and special needs students defined by the District as eligible for transportation.
ii) Unless specifically stated otherwise, the Contractor will provide all supplemental transportation services such as mid-day runs, shuttles, activity buses, choice, late buses, extended day, vocational, and special program services.
iii) Exhibit A provides details as to the majority of the supplemental services, but is not intended to be the complete listing of all such services.
C) Transportation Parameters
i) The Contractor will provide Transportation in conjunction with certain parameters established by the District. These include:
a) School building instructional starting and dismissal bell time schedule;
b) Earliest bus arrival and latest bus departure times for each school or school program;
c) Maximum ride times by grade level or educational program;
d) Maximum riders per seat;
e) Assignment of monitors, aides, or attendants;
f) Student pickup and drop policies;
g) Special needs transportation policy;
h) Hours of operation.
ii) A list of the District’s transportation parameters can be found in Exhibit A.
D) Routing Service Parameters
i) Routing services are defined as providing routing software, designing bus routes, assigning riders, pairing or packaging bus routes, and/or optimizing accordingly.
ii) The Contractor is to provide routing services.
iii) The Contractor will provide Transportation service in conjunction with certain routing parameters established by the District, which may include:
a) Maximum walk distances to school attended,
b) Maximum student walk distances to bus stop by grade level or program,
c) Minimum distances between bus stops,
d) Corner and arterial bus stop procedures,
e) Local practices,
f) A list of the District’s routing parameters can be found in Exhibit A.
E) Safe Service
i) Student, District employee, constituent, and Contractor employee safety is paramount and will be the highest priority consideration for both the Contractor and the District.
ii) The Contractor shall not intentionally compromise safety in order to achieve any of the service parameters previously referenced.
iii) The Contractor shall not perform an unsafe act to achieve Contract or related performance criteria.
iv) The Contractor shall inform the District of any District policies or practices or instructions that may conflict with safety prioritization.
v) Accidents involving injuries to any parties, regardless of perceived fault, should be reported to District officials within fifteen (15) minutes of the Contractor becoming aware of the incident.
vi) The District may request an accident investigation to be completed and communicated to the District within 24 hours of the incident.
F) Minimum Service Level Criteria
i) The Contractor will monitor, account for and report to the District its success with fulfilling these minimum service criteria:
a) On-time performance (10 minutes late) in morning: 99.0 % or better
b) On-time performance (10 minutes late) in afternoon: 99.0 % or better
c) Notify school building official in any instance where students may arrive at school or at home more than 10 minutes late.
d) Runs over 20 minutes late: less than 0.5% (one half of one percent)
e) Students left on bus unattended: zero
f) Unauthorized student riders: zero
g) Kindergartners left without custodial individual: zero
h) Preventable Accidents: less than 1.5 accidents per 100,000 miles operated (rolling 6 months)
i) Monitors/attendants on all buses required by IEP: 100%
j) 90% or more of the buses must pass the Missouri State Highway Patrol school bus inspections on the first attempt.
k) No buses will be placed “out of service” (deemed having one or more major defects) by the Missouri State Highway Patrol inspectors.
l) Compile and provide monthly reports for:
(1) Vehicle odometer readings,
(2) Route listings containing route number and eligible rider names,
(3) Activity bus utilization.
ii) Data will be provided to the District by the 15th of each month for measuring compliance with the criteria. The Contractor will be deemed to be in non-compliance if the following events occur:
a) This data is not reported for two (2) consecutive months;
b) This data is reported late for four (4) consecutive months;
c) One or more of the criteria is not met for two (2) consecutive months, or for three (3) months out of the last five (5) months; this is not limited to the same criteria recurring.
iii) If a non-compliance event occurs, the Contractor is automatically on notice with or without formal notice from the District. A non-compliance event must be cured within 60 days of its initial occurrence. If a non-compliance event is not cured, Minimum Service Level Criteria Performance Penalty will be imposed.
3) Contractor Accountabilities & Responsibilities
A) Contractor Resources
i) The Contractor will provide sufficient manpower to serve the District’s Transportation needs by having enough drivers and other personnel, such as monitors, to staff each daily route bus:
a) The Contractor will maintain an adequate staff of extra or “spare” drivers to address driver absences and no-shows.
b) The Contractor will not make a practice of “covering” open routes (routes with no driver available) with other routes.
c) The Contractor will actively recruit, train, and hire drivers for known, and reasonably anticipated, driver vacancies.
d) Contractor shall be solely responsible for hiring, disciplining and discharging personnel employed by the Contractor to perform its obligations hereunder.
ii) The appearance of the Contractor’s vehicles and facilities will meet the higher of:
a) standards specified by the District in an Exhibit to this Contract, or
b) customary and reasonable standards for the industry and/or local area.
iii) The appearance of the Contractor’s employees and work areas will meet the higher of:
a) standards specified by the District in an Exhibit to this Contract, or
b) customary and reasonable standards for surrounding school district operations.
iv) The District may impose specific dress, condition, or cleanliness standards upon the Contractor as the District deems to be appropriate and legal.
v) The Contractor will provide a property (or properties) within the school district boundaries of sufficient size and capabilities to house and service the Contractor’s vehicles.
vi) The Contractor will comply with all local zoning ordinances for properties used by the Contractor.
B) Contractor Employee Conduct
i) The conduct of Contractor’s employees will meet the higher of:
a) standards specified by the District in an Exhibit to this Contract, or
b) customary and reasonable standards for the District’s area.
ii) The Contractor will be responsive to District input as to any personnel or conditions deemed to be substandard by the District.
iii) The District has the authority to request a change in the Contractor’s transportation director if the District, in its sole discretion, determines that the performance of the transportation director is unacceptable.
C) Contractor Vehicles
i) The Contractor shall provide a sufficient number of vehicles of sufficient quality/dependability to perform the Transportation services within the Minimum Service Level Criteria.
a) The Contractor shall adhere to an average vehicle age requirement of not to exceed five (5) years, determined upon August 1 of each school year.
b) The Contractor shall adhere to an absolute age requirement of not to exceed ten (10) years, determined upon August 1 of each school year.
c) The Contractor shall adhere to a minimum spare vehicle requirement of 10% to assure vehicle maintenance matters do not interrupt daily Transportation.
ii) The Contractor shall provide the vehicle equipment typically used in providing pupil transportation service. This includes wheelchair lift vehicles, wheelchair tie downs and similar equipment.
iii) Vehicle air conditioning is required only when a student’s IEP dictates such.
iv) Multiple video cameras with audio are required on all (100%) of the daily route vehicles; the system will allow for videos to be emailed to school officials upon request.
v) GPS units are required on all (100%) of the daily route vehicles; the system will allow for a centralized active tracking of vehicles whereabouts.
vi) Two-way radios will be present on each vehicle; the SJSD Director of Transportation will receive one radio.
vii) Vehicles will be marked with the District’s name on the belt line of each side.
viii) The exterior and interior of the vehicles will be regularly cleaned.
ix) The Contactor shall provide sufficient vehicles as spares or supplemental vehicles to perform the District’s prime time activity trips without disrupting daily Transportation.
a) The District anticipates that as many as ten (10) prime-time activity buses may be needed from time to time.
b) A minimum of six (6) vehicles should be equipped for activity trips:
(1) 72 passenger or larger transit style,
(2) five years of age or newer, and
(3) with high ceilings, white roofs, tinted glass, upper storage racks, and full body exterior luggage storage compartments.
D) Vehicle Maintenance
i) The Contractor shall provide all aspects of the vehicle maintenance program, encompassing the shop, shop equipment, scheduling, trained technicians, parts, supplies, tires, service agreements, etc.
ii) The Contactor will achieve at least a ninety percent (90 %) first attempt pass rate with each Missouri State Highway Patrol school bus inspection.
iii) The Contractor will have no buses declared to be “out of service” (requiring one or more major repairs) during any Missouri State Highway Patrol school bus inspection.
iv) The Contractor warrants that its maintenance program, scheduling and related processes will not negatively impact the quality of daily Transportation.
E) Trial (Dry) Runs
i) The Contractor will perform at least one trial (dry) run (completing bus runs at the scheduled times without the students on board) within the ten (10) calendar days before the first day of school. This process will be coordinated with District officials who may monitor the process without restriction. The Contractor will report the results of the trial run to the District within 24 hours of the dry run day.
ii) The Contractor shall conduct trial runs for new or substitute drivers or if routes are significantly altered to assure service levels are maintained.
iii) The Contractor will not be compensated for performing trial runs.
F) Student Rider Registration and Notification
i) The Contractor will provide the District with a list of bus routes and stops thirty (30) calendar days before the first day of school. Such routes will comply with the parameters in Exhibit A.
ii) The District will communicate bus routes and stops to the patrons before the start of school.
iii) The Contractor will maintain a list of riders for each route throughout the school year.