‘Hurts their hearts’: CityLink Abilene struggles to provide transportation services due to staff shortages

ABILENE, Texas ( KTAB/KRBC ) – CityLink is grappling with significant challenges in providing transportation services to the community. The shortage of personnel, particularly drivers, has led to service cutbacks, affecting the accessibility of CityLink’s services, especially for those with disabilities.

The General Manager of CityLink, Lauren Stevens, has been with the company for about 12 years. She has observed fluctuations in the availability of CityLink’s services for the community as a whole in public transportation.

“There is nothing new that we are facing hardship. It’s not an excuse that I don’t have the resources to buy the services that the community desires and deliver needs. It’s a fact. We are having a very hard time finding available workers who want to work at the capacity that is needed.”

With only 4-6 drivers serving the entire town, they have had to make difficult decisions regarding transportation.

“We had to scale back and make a very hard decision to stop the transportation to those that are three-fourths of a mile away from the bus stops,” Stevens shared. “We are obligated by the Federal Transit to serve the community from a three-quarter mile buffer around the bus stops. That is what they say is a must. The City of Abilene said that they would like to see transportation within the city limits for everybody within the city limits.”

She added that those who traveled with CityLink from February through May may have felt the impact of the hardship.

“People not getting rides because the system said there’s an overload on the van, so they kick their rides out… People who have been on the bus for longer than an hour, which they should not be on the bus longer than an hour, pick-up times 2-3 hours behind because we have an hour slot that contains 30 or more trips within that hour,” Stevens explained.

She mentioned a greater demand for resources and time, especially with a limited number of drivers.

“You can only do so much within an hour. We are doing our very best. Our drivers are very stressed. A lot of them are emotionally tied to the riders and it hurts their hearts, and so we are doing the best that we can,” Stevens shared while holding back tears.

The Mayor’s Advisory board asked if CityLink could contact the clients if an issue arose and urged better communication.

“We’ve got to have a timeline, and you know what? Sometimes you don’t reach those goals, but as long as you’re communicating that and you know that there’s stuff that’s the and work out, that’s better than hearing the same thing every two months, of you know, we don’t have enough drivers, we don’t have enough — so there needs to be better communication,” the board stated.

The board also mentioned hearing from residents who are trying to get to and from their appointments, such as Betty Hardwick patients, who have been struggling with transportation issues within CityLink.

Stevens explained that the ADA has regulations and guidelines on what they can and cannot do. It states that they cannot prioritize different types of trips. She mentioned that they have discussed this question among themselves but are still seeking an answer as to why that is the case.

When asked whether the lack of personnel could affect the work environment, Stevens shared that there are a variety of reasons for employees to leave.

“We’ve had several different reasons. Just take the last 30 days. There have been a majority of people who literally just don’t come back. They don’t call. They don’t show up. They just disappear. There’s been a few people that said personal reasons, from family issues at home so they can’t work the hours anymore, to personal health reasons. It is an older population that we have in some of the drivers. That plays a lot with it. Then there are some that have better opportunities. They can go work somewhere else for more money with less responsibility and feel like they’re not being overworked,” Stevens explained. “A lot of them are frustrated because there is too much work time and not enough personal time, and we keep asking, “Can you extend your hours today?” We have several rides, and we need to ask you if you’ll go over a couple of hours. Some of them will do it, some of them are so exhausted they don’t want to do it. There’s just so much people can do, what they are willing to do. This is their job, not their life. We’ve heard that. Some of them, very few of them, will say pay.”

This is a problem not just at a local level but statewide. Some areas have offered sign-on bonuses, grants, and other employee retention incentives. However, both rural and urban areas have experienced a staff shortage.

“We have done a referral bonus. We’ve done a sign-on bonus in the past probably five years duration. Very little results from that. We were hoping to see bigger results from that. Here, in the past probably six months, we’ve thrown the ideas back out at our employees, and there has been really no good positive feedback,” Stevens shared. “We’ve even changed the vehicles from CDL to non-CDL vehicles for the vans, trying to get in drivers where you don’t have to go through the CDL portion. You can drive with the license you have. I saw a little bit of an impact on that, but then they got burned.”

Director of Transportation Services Don Green mentioned that CityLink is the primary mode of transportation in the city. However, they are also exploring additional options to complement it.

“CityLink is the transit provider for the city. We are exploring different ways, and with technology, there are now a couple of different ways that we can provide and supplement that service with contracts. One is Zip Zone, which I think you guys are aware of, and we are looking at ways to expand that. So those things come at a cost, though. They’re not going to be the same cost as riding the bus, so we have to be careful about how we expand that,” Green shared. “I think it’s [Zip Zone] improving every month as far as ridership goes. I really haven’t heard any complaints from customers or passengers for that. Applying that type of model to paratransit is just not possible. For those who are in a mobility device, you’ve got to have one; for those who otherwise qualify for paratransit and need to get to the doctor but they don’t need to have a mobility device on that vehicle or they have a lift on the vehicle or anything like that, that is easier. But it is how we manage that within the scheduling and all of that. We are looking into that there. We actually did a request for qualifications for a consultant to help us out with that. So we are moving forward with that, and so we are looking for ways.”

While investigating potential improvements, Green and a consultant explored integrating rideshare services such as Uber and Lyft to enhance paratransit options.

“Part of the study is to look at Uber and Lyft to incorporate them into how they use them, and it might be that during certain hours of the day the city, for those who are paratransit qualified, the city would contribute an amount the ride would cost. The city would give a credit to the ride, but that will not be 100% towards that ride. That is what we are looking at, and we have had conversations with consultants on the very thing,” Green shared.

He added that they have had contracts with entities like Disability in Action and local taxis, but the contracts were dropped.

“Disability in Action, because of their own issues, they were not able to continue that contract with us. We also had a contract with a taxi company in town. They have dropped that as well. The contract was not renewed with him. Uber and Lyft, we contacted or tried to contact them several years ago, but they were not interested in partnering with us at all. We think the consultant we have talked to they are already doing this in other cities in Texas, and this is a Texas company, so we think there is the possibility to get an arrangement with Uber and Lyft to get that type of service to supplement our paratransit fans,” Green said.

The board requested Stevens create a timeline or plan to present to the board within the month. They will follow up in September to review the progress.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTAB - BigCountryHomepage.com.