It seems the bus stories never end. This morning again, hundreds of parents were again left waiting in the cold with their children at the bus stops. Many parents contacted TLS to say their buses were not showing up and when they tried reaching the company’s offices, there was no answer.
TLS attempted multiple times to reach the offices, but to no avail.
“Every day there’s another story with them”, one of several frustrated parents told TLS today. “These guys have no consideration”, another parent wrote in an email.
TLS again spoke with a Board of Education member this morning who assured us that actions are being taken and that the committee is currently suggesting ideas to the board regarding this particular bus company, which has seen hundreds of complaints over the last few months.
Last week, TLS reported about a bus company, incidentally the same company, which left over 1,500 children waiting, and never showed up.
The company excused itself to some of the parents saying there were some buses which needed to refill on gas.
However, TLS inquired about that and were told there were a number of buses from the company out for inspection, yet the parents were not made aware of it.
“They bit off more than they can chew”, an official at the BOE tells TLS, referring to the double runs the company attempts to cover. “We are actively working on it”, he says.
“We have already met this company in closed session and have given them enough warnings and it is now time that we had a County hearing to remove them from our approved vendor list”, Board Of Education member Yoni Silver said last week. “Our children deserve a lot better then this kind of treatment”, he says.
i am going down to the boe today to give them a piece of my mind.
i’m just curious, does it help to try to get the menahels involved? or do they have no choice which company they use next year?
I’ve had it. The bus company should either put me on their payroll or I’m keeping the check! I also want a job where n/o cares if I only show up half the time. I called bus companies, I’ve called BOE many times. NOT ONE RETURN PHONE CALL! Anyone have any other suggestions? Does the Menahel have a say as to who they will hire next year? Oh did I mention – the kids get disciplined for not coming on time, after waiting for an hour every time?
It is time for heads to role!!!
ENOUGH ENOUGH ENOUGH!
CHUTZPA, BIG CHUTZPA, MAJOR CHUTZPA. Time for an UPROAR against this bus failure company.
My boys are car pooled as equal times to bus showing up. Daily routine day after day. Children wait in the cold for 45 min to no show, then parents break heads how to get kids school!
Please post info, numbers, etc. Whom to contact to remove this so called company as a vendor. They should be shut down and prosecuted for the breach and lies. They should be sued .If you equal the monetary cost: GAS, MILEAGE and WORK LOSS from all parents who have to drive instead of bus showing up equals to THOUSANDS of $$$$ in losses.
A frustrate parent!
Sick and tired of my daughter waiting in the cold every morning. When I call, it is either busy or they tell me to speak to X and she is never in. Yesterday I asked the person who answered if she is ever in. Her response: I think she is avoiding coming in. Oh great! And when the bus finally shows up its a different bus (from another bus company) and a different driver every morning. Who can we call to take care of this once and for all.
why is y silver only conserned about this bus company. what about the other ones that have dropped childern off in very unsafe ways. also what about all the special needs of the tiny tot … and ld children he caused not to be able to get the services they need?
I guess they take turns. Yesterday, our bus didn’t show up. Today it was someone else’s. They don’t have enough busses to go around so they pick a few runs to miss every day. Or they stick an extra run in between runs and then come 20 minutes late and say that there was traffic. It is criminal to allow the kids to wait outside for so long in the freezing cold. Keep calling the BOE to file a complaint. The more the merrier. If they get enough complaints they will eventually HAVE to do something about it.
This wouldn’t happen if the BOE never got rid of their buses and started contracting out, so much for all you conservatives and your free market. The BOE should purchase buses and handle busing in house again, I think at this point it would save money and give them more control over what goes on out there on the roads.
This company has sheer chutzpah unseen and unheard of elsewhere. I’d much more prefer my kids get picked up on time by nisht fun unzere than to be treated like this. It messed up my whole morning. Get rid of this company. Rescind ALL their contracts NOW. Period. Enough with the warnings. They think they’re above everything and need to be shown they aren’t.
Who can I call about this sham? Chutzpah at an unbelievable level.
Has anyone asked a rav if its mesira to call BOE? I want to call but not sure about it.
Please, Yoni, get them removed. My wife and I are suffering, as are our kids!!
Either we get this bus company removed or the BOE members removed!!!
to #10. I don’t know if it’s mesirah, but this company could be liable for a lot of frostbite issues if they don’t shape up soon. Try standing outside in 20 degrees (or colder with the wind on the corner)for 45 minutes, even if you’re “bundled up”. And how about making up for lost pay because the parents couldn’t get to work on time?
The whole last week my daughter waited between 25-30 minutes for the bus to come. Yesterday after waiting 35 minutes the bus never showed up, the kids were totally numb. Who cares at this bus company? No one! They hang up on you when you call and never help you out. the BOE should take away their contracts in middle of the year and get a reliable bus company to do these runs instead.
at one time Lakewood had its own bus company, with its own drivers, whos children went to the schools, and they were township BOE workers who took pride in their jobs. then someone got the bright idea to outsource the busing for the townships children, both public and private. Now many years later it continues to blow up in the BOE’s faces, lets fix this system once and for all and realize that outsourcing is not the answer,
The boe is not taking complaints over the phone.
Reading about the bus horror stories reminds me of when we lived in Lakewood and I had to ride with the busses to try and get the drivers to know the routes and not skip my kids. Once my daughter got home hours late as the bus driver just skipped our stop and the bus company owner had to go pick up my daughter personally.
Now, I live in a community that does not have busing paid for by the local government and we must either do carpool or pay for private busing. The one year that we paid for busing ($2,400 for two children) the bus was reliable and pleasant and did not come with the unreliability and unprofessionalism that we experienced in Lakewood. We felt the pinch in our wallets, not in aggravation.
We also pay tuition that is roughly double what we were paying in the Lakewood schools. I often feel that the leadership in my present community is less willing to help the community as a whole survive financially than is the leadership in Lakewood. However, the teachers at the schools here do get paid, and we have not had any strikes despite the economic situation.
While I sympathize with the difficulties encountered by the children and their parents, I wonder if the communitites resolve to keep costs low for families with young children is at least partly responsible for these difficulties.
Any thoughts?
if you noticed the bus was not coming did you use common sense and drive your child/children to school.
it’s time to stop complaining- drive your child, save the Lakewood residents 20 million and help reduce our taxes
for all of you who left a message- do you rent or own and pay taxes. Get real
Im sorry to say you all sound like a bunch of teenagers!
Stop all this complaining! What are you gaining by letting out all your anger like this. If you have a prob, deal with it in a mature fassion!
You sound like a bunch of 10th graders complaining! I feel sorry for your childrens teachers, if this is how you are behaving HOW DO YOUR CHILDREN BEHAVE?!
To senior:
YES, I own and pay ALOT of taxes(almost doubled in the past few yeras). Does that make you happier? You have NO benefit from the school system which eats up over 60% of our taxes. However, there was a time when you had children in school and you benefitted greatly. We never did and never will. Bussing is the only thing we receive from the BOE. Can you allow us that much???
To #19
With you’re capitalizing the last sentence, you speak like just another Anti-Semite.
This is called acting like children? TLS is our only link to assistance when noone picks up the phones.
What a hypocrite you are! How many millions did your children’s education cost the taxpayer? Why did you not homeschool to save the taxpayers money?? Where are your grandchildren at this moment? I hope they’re in school and not robbing a bank! Pull them out!
its time!! its time for US as parents to have a way to be notified EVERY SINGLE DAY of when the bus will arrive. With all the technology available why can we not have a system to let us know when or in how may minutes the bus will come. They have this on city buses across the country. this will solve Everything.
Mookie…you wouldn’t know one if they smacked in face.
#12 Right on get rid of both!!!
To senior,
Yes, I did end up driving my kids. But first we waited for 30 minutes in the cold. Yes, I pay taxes, lots and lots of them, and all I get from the school part of it is bussing. Please allow me that much.
#23 your right on. That would really help. and would be cool!!
just some thoughts…
maybe the company is in a cash-flow pinch.
maybe they need help with managment.
maybe they need help with staffing.
etc.
how about instead of complaining, try offering some posotive suggestions. if for nothing else it would be a good exersise.
Is there anyone on TLS anymore who is not a bored teen with a Blackberry?
There is very little to debate. We are consumers. We pay taxes, and if we rent, taxes are still figured into the cost of ownership, and thus, rent. The buses are supposed to come on time. If they don’t, we have right to demand different companies. We have an unfortunate circumstance wherein the board represents Lakewood’s citizens in hiring bus companies, which moves the consumers a step further away, and it takes longer to get something done.
They started out with all the good will on their side. How bad does the bus company have to be to have the entire frum community begging to hire others? That should demonstrate just how justified all the complaining is. Thank you TLS, for giving individuals a place to realize that they are not the only ones being shafted.
complain, complain, complain!!! how about DO (yes DO!) something about it?
ask the BOE for the “form”. fill it out and and maill or hand it in! the numbers will force the change!
This is an outrage. They come whenever they want. This is the only service we get and now we don’t get this. Surprised it took this long to get the community going.
to 27, our kids (precious neshamos yadi, yadi, yadi…) are freezing on dangerous curbsides, we are loosing pay and our bosses are gettgin fed up with us (or our spouses) coming late, the comapny has been completely unresponsive, and you want restraint! you sound like a liberal fool! Love will make all the world’s evil go away, right?
#23, what can we do to get that started?
i have spent hours on this situation. the bottom line is that the BOE say that they need a paper trail of formal complaints from parents as well as a complaint from the administartor of the school on the school letterhead in order for the board to take action. you can go down to the BOE or they can mail you a form. i went down there today….
How is that the answer to EVERYTHING?? Say we got this program what good good will it do?? So you’ll know EXACTLY that the bus isn’t coming?? – I have 4 different bus companies come pick up in the morning one for my high school boy one for my High School girls one for my elementary boys and one for my little girl – 3 out of the 4 come like clockwork every day – my little one nebach has a different story EVERY day. If you got this company to ave this program it WON’T help!! They don’t have ENOUGH buses!!! – the real solution is to get RID of the problem. PERIOD!!
to the person who asked about being ‘mosar’ : i asked a few pple who know these things and was told that it was ok to call about the bus company.
to 32. its really simple. gmail account gives you all the tools you need (i implemented this in my business). ask Orchos Chaim, they do it (sms updates).
to Yatchy says
“This is the only service we get and now we don’t get this”
what does that mean? , everything else that this town provides to it residents is the same for all who live here . If you are referring to not using the public schools well thats your call ,you certainly have a right to do that
This is what we have to complain about. The second day of school I called the woman whose child is at the stop before me and she calls me when the bus comes, then I go outside with my son. When the bus is more than fifteen minutes late we carpool, with the child the stop after mine. If this keeps up, the bus coming late for next year, we (3 parents) already decided to carpool, and yes both my husband and I work and we have other kids that are on a good schedule.
There is a lot to be done, but first calm down, let the school principals/menahelim be involved without shouting or screaming, write out the complaint forms from the BOE and remember to breathe. We want out children to arrive at school excited to learn and not coming off their parents ranting into their cell phones about the bus problem.
Well lets see What our lakewood taxdollars do here, The BOE has or Should have a Board Attorney Thats What THEY ARE there for , LEGAL MATTERS ,HELLO Lets take it there and See our dollars at work !!!! This should solve the PROBLEM AND THAT COMPANY WILL BE GONE !!!! The OWNER dont know the first thing about Bussing !Lets put that Bussing mess on the attorneys street and SEE WHERE HE DRIVES IT !!!!!!!!!!
To Thank God says:
NOONE rants anymore on cellphones. All we do is type!
tax dollars are out of control and growing. I laugh when I read bussing is the only thing you get. What about police, garbage pick up, Yeshiva garbage pick up. Public schools garbage pick up is paid by local tax dollars, the politics in town have the township paying for Yeshiva garbage. What about all the other people in town paying taxes with less service
To #38, if only more people would be like you!
Lucky are your children!
are heads rolling? or they are well connected?
The fact that one company seems to have the problem points a finger at them. However, perhaps the school schedules should be adjusted to accomadate the timing of second runs, traffic etc. Perhaps it’s time we allow boys and girls on the same bus. Are our children that weak and vulnerable? Put up a divider or something. Let’s solve the problem.
start fining the bus companies who are not performing.