GRAFTON — A last-minute change in bus routes is adding stress to the start of the school year for some families who live in more rural parts of the Mascoma Valley.
A few days before the first day of school Tuesday, Mascoma Valley Regional School District Superintendent Amanda Isabelle got a call from Butler’s Bus Service that, starting Wednesday the routes would not operate as planned.
“Typically there are some changes we have to make as we start the year with the bus routes. I expect challenges,” Isabelle said in a Thursday phone interview. “This year, however, has been extremely hard, being short two (out of nine) bus drivers we planned on having.”
The change in driver availability was due to a “personnel issue,” Steve Landon, location manager at Butler’s Bus Service branch in White River Junction, said in a Friday phone interview. He declined to elaborate further.
School board members had approved nine, routes for full-size buses at the board’s Aug. 12 meeting, Isabelle said. Butler’s also provides vans to the district, which are used primarily to transport students enrolled in special education programs.
After Isabelle learned that the bus routes would be altered, the board approved updated routes during its Aug. 26 meeting.
Now, the Mascoma district, which serves the Mascoma Valley towns of Canaan, Enfield, Dorchester, Grafton and Orange, will have eight bus routes, which board members approved at the meeting. Landon said Butler’s will also run five van routes for the district.
“It was a big shock to us, really, really difficult on parents for that last-minute change,” Tim Josephson, who chairs the Mascoma Valley Regional School Board, said in a Thursday phone interview.
“You’re kind of back against the wall. You really don’t have a choice,” Josephson said. If the district tried to stick to the nine routes initially planned, bus drivers could have to do more than one route, resulting in children being late to school.
“It’s hard,” Isabelle said. “And it’s hard on parents to receive one notification and then all of a sudden have to change the second day of school.”
Among those parents is Elaina Bergamini, who lives in East Grafton and has three children ages 9, 10 and 15 who attend schools in Canaan. Based on the new routes, she said her children would spend more than two hours round trip on a bus each school day.
“It’s unreasonable for them to sit on a bus for 2½ hours every day,” Bergamini said in a Thursday phone interview.
Her children have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, which makes long bus rides more challenging. As a result, she’s started picking up and dropping off her kids from school.
“I don’t have a choice,” Bergamini said. Last year, her children were part of a van route that resulted in a 30-minute commute each way. She has been having ongoing conversations to see if that is a possibility going forward.
The district will pay Butler’s around $1.29 million during the 2025-2026 school year, according to a copy of the contract. The district is working with Butler’s on being reimbursed for parts of the contract the company cannot fulfill, Isabelle said. A few years ago when Mascoma put the contract out to bid, Butler’s was the only company that responded.
More than half of Mascoma’s roughly 1,100 students take the bus, Isabelle said. Those students are spread across a larger geographic area compared to other districts that Butler’s serves, including the Hartford School District, Landon said.
“If someone lives a distance from one of the schools, they’re going to be on a bus for a decent amount of time,” Landon said, adding that the goal is to keep kids on buses for an hour or less each way.
Butler’s has 140 employees that drive buses for school districts on both sides of the Upper Valley, Landon said. While any bus driver certified to drive in New Hampshire can also drive in Vermont without going through another licensing process, that isn’t the case for the reverse.
“If a bus driver gets licensed in Vermont, I can’t just send them to Mascoma today. It’s not legal,” Landon said, adding that those who have a Vermont certification have to go through a separate background check in New Hampshire and complete an additional school bus certificate, including a written test.
That makes it more challenging to move drivers around to different districts.
Throughout the summer, both the school district and Butler’s have worked to recruit drivers. Butler’s bus drivers can earn between $25 to $32 per hour, depending on experience and which district they drive for, Landon said.
There was a hiring notice on the electronic sign outside Mascoma Valley Regional High School and a sign on a school bus parked in the school’s parking lot, which is visible from Route 4, Josephson said.
“We are constantly telling people if you know someone who can be a driver, please drive,” Josephson said.
There are two bus drivers that will be assigned to the Mascoma district once they complete the New Hampshire school bus driver certification process, which typically takes around 90 days, Landon said.
The hope is that Butler’s will be able to resume Mascoma’s nine contracted bus routes once those drivers come on board.