After greater than a month with out buses at two Ontario college boards, a tentative deal has been reached, doubtlessly bringing an finish to weeks of transportation chaos for fogeys and their youngsters.
College students at each the Renfrew County District Faculty Board close to Ottawa, and its Catholic counterpart, have been pressured to search out other ways of attending to class this yr after the 2 boards failed to succeed in an settlement with bus corporations earlier than college resumed.
The 2 boards blamed the Ford authorities for the problem and mentioned an absence of provincial funding to move youngsters to highschool left them in a pinch. For weeks, the boards and bus corporations have been deadlocked, with either side adamant they couldn’t discover frequent floor.
The federal government was requested to ship the boards more cash and refused, reiterating figures that present a rise in year-on-year funding for the boards.
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Ontario NDP training critic Chandra Pasma mentioned that within the comparatively rural areas served by the Renfrew County college boards, the standoff meant some dad and mom driving hours day-after-day to get their youngsters to highschool.
“You have to remember Renfrew County is a big place, so some people are driving two hours a day to and from school to pick their kids up and drop them off,” she mentioned in a late September interview with Ontario Chronicle.
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“Some people are missing work, some people have lost their jobs because of it, some people are finding they have to work into the evening or find other routes to be able to keep working.”
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On Sept. 20, after greater than two weeks with out buses, each boards promised dad and mom monetary compensation for the scenario.
“We are working urgently with the Ministry to explore the possibility of financial compensation for families without school bus service and will share details as soon as possible,” mentioned a press release from the Catholic board learn, greater than two weeks after youngsters returned to class on Sept. 4.
“We understand that this is not a solution, but we hope to mitigate some financial strain that the transportation disruption may have caused for families.”
At one level, in a notice to folks, one of many boards urged cuts may very well be essential to fund a bus deal, saying the price of buses could solely be coated by shifting cash “from education budgets to the transportation budget.”
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Then late on Monday, after repeatedly stalled talks, the boards introduced an settlement was shut.
A joint assertion from the varsity boards and bus corporations mentioned had been reached “in principle,” with a promise of finalized particulars by the tip of the week.
“A tentative start date for transportation services will be shared by the bus companies by Friday, Oct. 11 with confirmation of the start date to be received by early next week,” the assertion mentioned.
“The agreements will be finalized during the next week, but we can report that these are multi-year agreements that at minimum will run until the end of the 2028-2029 school year.”
Schooling Minister Jill Dunlop welcomed the tentative deal and repeated the federal government’s line that funding has elevated for varsity boards to spend on bussing.
“All school boards across Ontario received an increase to their student transportation budget this year, with double digit increases in Renfrew,” she mentioned in a press release.
“As a parent who relied on bus transportation for my own children, I understand the difficult position the disruption caused students and parents in Renfrew and I’m glad to hear students will finally have access to reliable transportation services and that parents will be compensated by the school boards.”
Pasma mentioned that the size of time it took to succeed in a deal, nevertheless, urged Renfrew County wasn’t a precedence for the province.
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“Maybe because it’s Renfrew County and it’s not on the government’s priority list — a little too far from Toronto, they feel like it can be ignored,” she mentioned.
“But the outrage people are feeling in Renfrew County is pretty high right now.”
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