"We Discovered it's Not Getting Better:" City Schools Trying to Get a Handle on Transportation Situation
The School Board heard from parents and staff about transportation woes at Tuesday's special meeting.
By Adele Uphaus
MANAGING EDITOR AND CORRESPONDENT
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School day schedule changes and an “opt-in” system are both being considered as ways to improve transportation within the Fredericksburg school division, staff said Tuesday.
The School Board called a special meeting six days into the 2025-26 school year to hear from parents and staff about the transportation system, which is “failing,” in the words of one parent.
“After the disastrous start to the school year’s transportation services, a family member remarked that the district would certainly send out a statement the next day,” said parent Katie Lomonaco. “Rather than that, we received desperate pleas for more bus staff … with not a word acknowledging that the transportation system was failing. Instead, [superintendent Marci Catlett’s] sincere apology for the stress and frustration this might have caused came a full week after the issues became apparent.”
Lomonaco said that during that time, her daughter, a first-grader, “endured being forgotten by her bus driver, berated by a different driver who told the children, ‘If you keep crying, you’ll never get home,’ and, on the good days, exceptionally long rides.”
Like many parents, Lomonaco said she has started picking up her daughter from school rather than having her ride the bus, which would not have dropped her off until 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, despite the new My Ride K-12 bus app showing that she had been returned an hour before that.
At least nine other parents spoke at Tuesday’s meeting, all expressing frustration and anger at the division’s planning and communication around transportation.
Catlett acknowledged that, “We know we’re in a desperate state.”
“This community has benefited from maybe an older way of accommodating transportation for our families that was working, and we want to get back to that,” she said. “The goal is to benefit from the technical piece to be efficient and streamlined, but still keep the human touch. That’s what we’re diligently and desperately trying to get to.”
Catlett said it became apparent that there was “a major problem” with transportation after the first day of school on Tuesday, August 19.
“On Wednesday and Thursday, there was a team of administrators and communication and transportation that worked all day long. We were hoping it would get better,” she said. “On Friday, we discovered it’s not getting better, so we need to all get together. And we’ve now met every day.”
As summarized by communications manager Katie Hornung in an email to the Advance on Monday, the problems are being caused by the division transitioning from paper-and-pencil routing to a new routing technology; opening two new schools; and on-boarding new transportation staff while also dealing with a shortage of drivers.
Routing coordinator Sandy Zimmerman told the board that she began building routes for the entire city on August 11, her first day on the job. She said she had to do in four days something that usually takes eight weeks to complete.
It’s not clear whether any planning for the new routes required by the opening of two new schools began while the previous routing coordinator was still in the job.
Don Upperco, director of operations, told the board about some of the actions being proposed to fix the situation, including “tweaking” school hours and moving to an “opt-in” system, in which the system would only route students whose parents ask for bus transportation.
Though some board members said they have concerns about parents potentially missing communication about the need to opt-in, transportation supervisor Jaral Jones—who was hired in July and previously worked as a dispatcher for Stafford County Public Schools’ transportation department—said this will “stabilize” the situation.
“It will get everything in place, and then we can work the process of how to add stops and build from there—as opposed to trying to deal with it while it’s already in motion,” he said.
But Jones said that double, and possibly triple, bus runs—which have students arriving home as late as 5:30 p.m.—will continue until there are more bus drivers on staff.
Three bus drivers left the first week of school, and another submitted a resignation on Tuesday, according to Sue Keffer, human resources director. She said the division was trying to fill seven vacancies as of Tuesday afternoon and that three job offers have been extended and several interviews scheduled.
However, deputy superintendent Matt Eberhardt told the board that the division needs more drivers beyond just filling the vacant positions, not to mention more substitute drivers.
“I’m not sure the numbers they gave you—if that’s even going to be enough,” he said. “We talked today and I think we probably need a couple more runs. I would challenge you all to think about needing 10 more drivers, and we need help finding those folks and keeping them in those jobs.”
Eberhardt said there will be a more thorough update on what is being done and proposed regarding transportation at the next meeting of the transportation task force on September 2.
And Catlett said that the division’s communication team will “work on daily updates as we make progress.”
“I feel that families would prefer to be kept updated,” she said.
This story was updated on August 28 at 5:46 p.m. to state that the transportation task force next meets on September 2. The previous version stated that the School Board next meets on September 2.
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