HALIFAX—The Halifax Regional Centre for Education and Stock Transportation are refusing to reveal what it would take to fire the school bus company, which has come under fire for late pickups, off-target drop-offs and poor communication.

The Star obtained a copy of the current contract for student transportation through a Freedom of Information request. The 34-page document was released with dozens of lines redacted, including the entire two-page article on termination.

A letter accompanying the release attributed the redactions to HRCE executive director Elwin LeRoux, but the chief operating officer of Stock, Terri Lowe, said her organization selected which lines it wanted blacked out before passing it back to HRCE.

Lowe said releasing the termination clause — which would describe how HRCE might walk away from its relationship with Stock — would put the company at a competitive disadvantage.

“We simply redacted information that we consider sensitive and that could harm us in future negotiations with other service providers. So those are the only things we really redacted. Apart from that we tried to be as transparent as possible.”

LeRoux said HRCE takes freedom of information and privacy “very seriously” and felt the redactions struck a necessary balance between the two.

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He added that HRCE’s corporate secretary — who handled the redactions on his behalf — determined the section on termination qualified as confidential information based on the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.

Stock Transportation was first contracted by the Halifax Regional School Board (HRSB) more than 20 years ago and is now almost three years into the latest 10-year contract.

The contract, which came into effect on July 1, 2016, was transferred to the HRCE from the HRSB when the provincial government dissolved school boards last year.

Trouble for the private bus operator — which has an office in Dartmouth — began in September 2018 during the first week of school, when hundreds of students and families were impacted by scheduling errors and miscommunications. Some students were dropped off at wrong locations or waited hours to be picked up.

Stock apologized for the flurry of disruptions, and Education Minister Zach Churchill promised a provincewide evaluation of student transportation, which he now says is nearing completion.

Since September, members of both opposition parties have continually pressed Churchill on Stock’s performance and his management of student transportation. NDP education critic Claudia Chender said she found the redactions “troubling.”

“Certainly, I think the contract needs to be looked at,” said Chender, MLA for Dartmouth South, in an interview. “And my understanding is that the government is doing that and I’m hopeful that that’s true and that that’s happening, but the most troubling part is that there’s big parts of the contract we can’t see.”

The contract released to the Star also removed names, fees, expenses and payment details, but Chender highlighted that she would like to know the contents of the termination article.

“I should be able to see what this is and be able to comment on it,” she said.

Tim Halman, PC MLA for Dartmouth East, called the redaction “offensive.”

“To me this should be public knowledge,” he told the Star.

Halman said issues with public school busing are “chronic” in his riding and he hears weekly about students being dropped off late for school.

“Health care is the No. 1 thing that often comes through my office, but after that it’s busing.”

Halman said he’d like to see Stock “put on notice.” In other words, he’d like to see them given an ultimatum, with one year to improve their performance.

Lowe recognized the disruptions from early in the school year but defended Stock’s overall performance.

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“We did have a few challenges at the beginning, but we’ve worked through those,” said Lowe. “Year to date we’re running 98 per cent on time, and this month we’re running 99 per cent on time.”

She added that Stock addressed communication difficulties by adding staff and phone lines at the Dartmouth office and introducing a new system for tracking and following up on calls.

The contract stipulates that HRCE can end the contract with Stock if there are three “critical disruptions of any type within any six-month period.” The details of how HRCE would pursue such an option, however, are in the redacted article on termination.

Chender said that while she’d like to know what that article contains, the point is essentially moot. Given that HRCE requires more than 200 buses, Chender doubts Stock has any viable competitors in Nova Scotia.

“They can’t fire them because they don’t have anyone else to hire,” she said.

According to HRCE, there was only one qualified bidder on the student transportation contract when it went to public tender in 2015.

“The only other option, I think,” said Chender, “would be for the government to take busing in-house — the Halifax Regional Centre for Education to run its own busing.”

Churchill said Stock is “absolutely” subject to consequences if it doesn’t live up to the contract expectations, including the possibility of termination. He would not say whether he thought the termination article should be released publicly.

“With the Freedom-of-Information process, that is separate from my office, so I do have to trust the Freedom-of-Information officers to make the appropriate decisions on what’s redacted and what’s not,” he said in an interview.

Churchill initiated a provincewide evaluation of busing last fall, including an online survey for families and consultation with stakeholders.

Churchill said the survey and the consultation are complete and his department is now parsing the results. While the evaluation considers busing across the province, the minister acknowledged that the bulk of problems and complaints are concentrated in Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM).

“We know that we have specific issues here in HRM that are very different from anywhere else in the province. We have particular frustrations here from parents and students and we’ll have some action to announce in the coming weeks on busing,” he said.

When asked whether he was considering bringing busing in-house, he said the education department hadn’t “landed on any decisions yet, but we do plan on making some adjustments before school year next fall.”

Jacob Ritchie, the director of operations services at HRCE, said for his department to take over for Stock it would have to hire hundreds of drivers and mechanics, buy hundreds of buses and establish a garage. He said it isn’t something that’s been discussed in the six months he’s been in the post.

“I’m focused right now on improving the service we provide in Halifax with our current contract service provider and with the contract we have. That’s really where my focus has been,” he said in an interview.

Ritchie acknowledged there have been some persistent issues around late busing and complaints from parents and guardians about communication but lately he’s “seeing some signs of positivity.”

Last November the Department of Education committed close to $2 million to add 37 more buses to Stock’s Halifax fleet. Ritchie said all those buses were operating by February and have helped to improve on-time delivery.

He added that a transportation specialist was hired into his department in March and is “really helping us understand what’s happening in the system with an eye to student transportation.”

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