AUBURN — This fall, school bus drivers may no longer be city employees; they could work for Northeast Charter of Lewiston.

School Superintendent Katy Grondin is exploring subcontracting bus driver jobs, she said. Auburn could save $300,000 a year, much of that by no longer providing health care to bus drivers, who work 20 hours a week.

If the School Department proceeds, the decision to privatize drivers will be decided by the School Committee in July, Grondin said.

The idea is not sitting well with those who drive the big yellow buses.

“I love my kids,” Bonnie Hersey said of the East Auburn students she transports. If she worked for Northeast, she wondered if she would drive the same students. “I think parents should be able to vote on this,” Hersey said.

Debra Therriault, who drives in the Danville area, agreed.

“I’m pissed off about this,” Therriault said. “I’ve been working for 13 years and now they’re going to take away my insurance and what I’ve worked for.”

She is one of the union representatives for drivers in the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers.

“I live in Auburn, I pay my own wages,” Therriault said, referring to taxes she pays that go to city workers’s salaries.

During contract negotiations “they plead poverty,” then turned around and give Grondin a $5,000 raise last year, along with other raises and bonuses to Business Manager Judy Cyr and School Department Support services Director William Hunter, she said. If the budget’s so tight, “why would they accept a raise?” she asked.

Grondin responded that “every contract is negotiated,” and her $5,000 raise last year was to help bring her salary to $115,000, which is below what it should have been for a school superintendent.

Cyr and Hunter got 2 percent raises, similar as other workers. “We work 230 days and work more than 40 hours a week,” she said.

Bus drivers last year received a 1 percent raise. Like teachers, they  get health insurance where taxpayers pay for 100 percent of the premium; staff has to pay some of the health care premiums for family members.

Most Auburn drivers make $14.96 an hour, Therriault said. “We’re pretty lucky we get insurance.”

The move to make school bus drivers non-government employees has been “all kind of hush, hush,” Therriault said. The School Department has been bringing on Northeast drivers since December, she said.

“They’ve been telling us they can’t find any drivers. Then qualified people apply” and don’t get hired, she said. “Hunter had interviewed a driver and turned him down. Now he’s driving for us through Northeast.”

Therriault said she doesn’t understand what the city would save “other than health care. We argued the matter” when the two sides met June 6. “It’s still up in the air.”

Grondin said no decisions have been made. The first priority is to ensure Auburn students continue to get bused to school safely. Another consideration is saving taxpayers money.

“The City Council and School Committee are committed to looking at ways to do things differently to save money,” Grondin said. The School Department has received a request for proposals from private companies. Grondin said Tuesday she’ll issue a memo on the subject.

The union contract with bus drivers allows the School Department to subcontract if there are savings, Grondin said. The School Department is negotiating with the union and Northeast.

“We are asking that our employees be hired and continue driving Auburn students,” Grondin said. “We want to do right by our employees.”

When asked about health care, Grondin said full-time Northeast employees would be able to get health coverage, but it’s premature to talk about what’s being negotiated.

bwashuk@sunjournal.com

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