Las Vegas, NV (AP) – The Clark County School District will by raising the pay for new and current school bus drivers by at least 40% to try to reduce its pandemic-exacerbated staff shortage.
CCSD usually operates almost 1,600 bus routes but has about 240 school bus driver vacancies. At one point, staffing shortages became so acute that the Regional Transportation lent a hand to help.
Under raises announced earlier this month, current hourly pay for new hires will rise from $15.36 to $21.67 while the higher rates for experienced drivers will rise from just under $20 to just over $29.
The higher pay reflects more of what the position is, said Jennifer Vobis, CCSD’s executive director of transportation. “There’s a lot of responsibility in that job,”
Within the past year, the district approved recruitment and retention bonuses for drivers, on top of $2,000 bonuses for all CCSD employees who worked during the coronavirus pandemic.