School bus companies have muddled the ongoing strike with a new legal action that says the city must remove employee protections for drivers and matrons from all of its contracts — not just some — to ensure that bidding is competitive, The Post has learned.
Three of the major school bus companies — Staten Island Bus Inc., Lonero Transit Inc. and Pioneer Transportation Corp. — say existing companies are being unfairly hamstrung by the city’s decision to cut the job protections from just a handful of contracts that were recently put out to bid.
The city removed the so-called “Employee Protection Provisions” from contracts that it bid out in mid-December covering 1,100 school bus routes — which instigated a nearly 4-week, ongoing strike by the union representing most drivers and matrons. Those protections had been written into the contracts for 33 years.
But the companies serving the remaining 5,700 school-age bus routes are still bound by the provisions — which require that they hire the most senior drivers and matrons on any new routes they’re awarded — in contracts that won’t expire for up to three years.
That means new bus companies can submit lower bids to take over routes because they aren’t required to hire the veteran – and therefore most expensive – workers.
“The bus companies simply want to have the bidding done in a fair manner so all people bidding are treated the same,” said attorney Steven Shore. “We’re now being placed at a significant disadvantage.”
The contractors want the court to declare the employee protections unlawful and to prevent the city from awarding any future contracts with those provisions. They’re demanding a hearing by March 7.
The companies said they unsuccessfully tried to settle the matter out of court with the Department of Education.
A spokesperson for the city’s law department said, “We just received a copy of the lawsuit and are in the process of reviewing it.”