Lee County school bus drivers fear for safety during COVID-19 surge

School bus drivers in Lee County are fearing for their safety after the death of one of their own.

Tuesday, 19 Lee County school bus drivers were quarantined or hospitalized, forcing healthy workers to pick up extra routes. This comes as The School District of Lee County was already experiencing a driver shortage, and employed school bus drivers had already picked up extra routes, often delaying student drop-off times.

A District spokesman told us Lee County school district has hired 20 more drivers and is looking for more, but that’s not enough of a solution to keep pace with the number of drivers already in quarantine.

Jamie Michael, the president of the Support Personnel Association of Lee County, says many of the school bus drivers she represents wake up afraid they will contract COVID-19, especially after the death of school bus driver Vandrias Grant.

“With Ms. Grant passing away, you know, she was hired back in 1999, they’re looking at their safety, their families, you know, ‘Are they going to survive this?'”

Seven bus drivers in the District’s east zone alone are hospitalized after contracting COVID-19.

“It just compounds the difficulty of our driver shortage,” District spokesperson Rob Spicker said. “For instance, there was a day last week, toward the end of the week; 62 drivers called in sick, and 19 were quarantined, so it adds up to 111 drivers that were not working on that day last week.”

Spicker also told us they are still short over 100 bus drivers, so parents must continue to expect delays.

The District says it hears bus drivers’ concerns and hears their fears for their safety, but a mask mandate would defy the governor’s order.

“It’s political. It shouldn’t be political,” Michael said. “Our kids’ safety, our employees’ safety should not be political.”