A motion to cancel contracts for school busing in the Hastings and Prince Edward District School Board and issue new requests for proposals may never come to a vote on Monday.
Trustee Ernie Parsons has recently expressed concern that the organization that runs school busing for the board, and two others in the region, had granted contracts to companies owned by European and American companies.
Parsons is pushing for more local ownership to again be involved in school busing, however, Board Chair Dr. Kari Kramp will rule his motion out of order Monday.
Her report says Tri-Board Transportation was hired by the HPEDSB, the Algonquin Lakeshore Catholic and Limestone school boards to operate school busing and is a separate legal entity. Parson’s motion would effectively break a contract, not only with Tri-Board but with the other two boards involved.
In addition, the report states that the board is not in the busing business, and should not be, adding that it would be very costly to begin a separate process to grant busing contracts.
Trustee Parsons has been made aware of the chair’s intention and the reasons for the move to rule his motion out of order.
See the entire report on Parsons’ busing motion and Chair Kramp’s ruling beginning on page 50 of the board’s agenda.
