Beginning next year, the buses carrying Shelton children to and from school will be powered by propane.
The city’s Aldermen voted unanimously Feb. 28 to put a $1.1 million deposit down for a fleet of 60 propane-fueled buses that Mayor Mark Lauretti said will save Shelton hundreds of thousands of dollars annually.
“The savings are going to come in a couple of different forms, and they haven’t been firmed up yet,” Lauretti said. “The fuel differential alone is going to be about $180,000 a year difference.”
The total purchase price for the new fleet of buses — from Blue Bird, a Georgia-based manufacturer — will be $5,473,806.
The company is more than confident the technology is safe. Blue Bird uploaded a video to YouTube showing a propane tanked being shot by bullets from an array of handguns — at the same time.
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The city will make monthly payments beginning in August to a third-party lender for five years, at the end of which it will own the buses free and clear.
If maintained properly, the buses have a life expectancy of 10 to 12 years.
Lauretti and Aldermen on Thursday touted the move as beneficial economically and environmentally.
“I’m not sure that there’s anybody else in the state of Connecticut that is employing this kind of concept,” Lauretti said. “I could be wrong, but I don’t know of anybody else that has propane buses.”
“It’s very environmentally friendly,” the mayor added. “Residents, particularly parents who have kids in school that stand at the school bus stop, should appreciate this move.”
Allan Cameron, the Board of Education’s finance director, said after Thursday’s meeting that the school board will be putting out a request for bids for a company to operate and maintain the buses.
Lauretti said the city will build a propane filling station for the fleet, for which he said incentives from the state and federal government may be available.
“I’m trying to use our representatives in Hartford and Washington to run that down for us,” he said.
The costs of getting kids to and from school had been a question mark with respect to the Board of Education’s budget for 2013 – 2014.
The city’s current transportation provider, First Student, wanted about $500,000 more next year.
The school board, in preparing its budget request in December, used a “placeholder” figure of $262,197, anticipating savings by negotiating that figure downward.
Those negotiations didn’t pan out, but Lauretti suggested pursuing an agreement similar to the one the city has for its garbage and recycling service, whereby the city bought collection vehicles and contracted with a third party to operate them.
Budget Impact?
Board of Education Chairman Mark Holden said Feb. 25 he thought the placeholder increase of $262,197 for busing costs next year “should work” if the city goes forward with the propane-fueled bus plan.
He added that if the city could help bend the cost increase downward any more, the school board would obviously be receptive.
“We’ll see what’s going to happen,” Holden said. “Mark seems to think there will be some additional stuff. We’ll take a look at what he’s got. Obviously, from our perspective, if we can get a better deal, that’s great.
“The more money we can make available to the classroom, the better off we are,” Holden went on.
Meanwhile, the school board at a special meeting Feb. 13 voted unanimously to decrease its budget request for 2013 – 2014 by $403,737, to $66,836,326.
The reduced number is due to the city’s planned participation in the Connecticut Partnership Plan, which allows employers, municipalities, and boards of education to participate in the same health care plan as state employees.
Shelton’s current health insurance provider, Anthem, had wanted the city to pay a 17.5 percent higher premium next year.
Holden said that under the new health plan, annual cost increases will be much lower.
“Under the agreement, they cannot increase our rates by more than 3 percent per year,” Holden said. “So even at the end of the five years that we would be looking to go with them, if they went up the maximum amount, the rate would still be less than what Anthem is talking about for next year.
“It’s crazy stuff,” Holden went on. “Health insurance has gotten super-expensive recently.”
As it stands, the school district’s $66.8 million budget request represents an increase of $3,109,699 over the current year, or about 4.86 percent.
Lauretti has until March 22 to kick off the budget season with a request to Aldermen and the tax board.
He has said he plans to ask for more money for schools, but hasn’t yet arrived at concrete numbers.
“There’s a lot of things that we’re trying to do right now that is going to impact how much they don’t have to spend, the school buses being one of them,” Lauretti said Thursday (Feb. 28).
Regarding the budget in general, he said he hasn’t gotten deep into specific numbers yet.
“I live with the budget every day. It doesn’t take me long because I have familiarity with it,” he said. “After all these years with the same department heads, I know and they know what their needs are and what their needs are not. It’s not as complicated as it used to be.”
“A lot of them the line items are going to stay status quo, and there will be some increases in the payroll accounts because of contracts, which is standard, but other than that, there’s nothing that jumps out at us at this point,” Lauretti went on.
