Halifax-area transportation companies ramp up recruitment efforts for school bus drivers

After years of school bus driver shortages in the Halifax area, it appears the gap may be closing and it comes at just the right time with the new school year a few weeks away.

This is a very busy month for transportation company Transco in Dartmouth.

"There's more people needing more schools, more busing, and we're just trying to be able to provide the service that we need to provide for the people," said dispatcher Andy Taggart.

The company, a division of First Student, held a recruitment event Thursday in hopes of hiring more drivers and monitors.

"We're still heavily recruiting right now. We're feeling positive going into the new school year, but we're still seeing a slow roll in of applicants," said location manager Ainslie MacAdam.

For the past few years, there has been a shortage of drivers both locally and nationally.

"I see that being on the upswing now. I've noticed, here anyways, we seem to be on the upswing with the drivers, and having more people coming in to become school bus drivers," said Taggart. "Our training department is constantly training new people."

Finding enough drivers is no small feat. According to Halifax Regional Centre for Education (HRCE), it needs 400 buses to transport more than 30,000 children to and from school this September.

The division works with three school bus providers: Southland, Student Transportation of Canada, and Transco.

"We have not experienced any significant driver shortages recently, thanks to the hard work of our service providers with their recruitment," said a spokesperson for HRCE in an email to CTV News.

Attracting more drivers is just one of the many tasks Transco is currently in the process of.

"A lot of what we're doing right now is in-class training, on the road training. We're doing a lot of prep work with our fleet, a lot of preventative maintenance, and just working on the routing," said MacAdam.

She said they are hoping to hire another eight drivers and eight patrollers before September.

Taggart, who has been a dispatcher for around 30 years, is looking forward to seeing some new faces.

"People don't realize the joy that they get from being with these kids day in and day out. It's a phenomenal thing," said Taggart.

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