Bad Bus Drivers

I was reading Joseph Rose's "Commuting" column in today's Oregonian with interest. I don't think that he is anti bus driver or even anti union, I think he shares a frustration with me-why does the union insist on protecting some of these folks? As readers of this blog from last year know, I pointed out that all too frequently these bad bus drivers who end up being involved in some high profile incident usually have been involved in several other incidents, some of which met the criteria of the termination policy for their transit agency before the high profile incident.

The vast majority of C-Tran coach operators are very very good at their jobs. They get "it". They have the customer services skills, patience of Jobe, driving ability, and common sense to successfully drive a 40-foot, almost 40,000 pound bus safely down the highway. That said, some of them have no business being allowed behind the wheel of a public transportation agency vehicle. Any C-Tran drivers reading this, think about your co-workers and tell me there isn't at least one or two whom you know are a danger to not just the passengers but even you!

I'm not anti union. My father is in fact a member in good standing of ATU 757. He happens to drive a school bus. Unions can be wonderful things. They can and do protect the masses from being taken advantage of by companies, government agencies, etc. There are however times when their loyalty to one another seems more than a little misguided.

I respect that when it comes time for contract negotiations that the union protects you from being taken advantage of by C-Tran, Tri Met or any other transit agency. What I don't get is why you do not seem to grasp or want to understand that the handful of menaces behind the wheel of your buses make ALL of you look bad. Making this situation even worse is that there have been some high profile instances with Tri Met operators that the media has jumped on. When I have a co-worker who is a total Bozo, I'm not afraid to say it. Some of you on the other hand are.

How many times now has Psycho been called on the carpet for this or that issue? I know for a fact that the Union rep has gotten involved a few times. This person not only get's into disputes with passengers, doesn't make sure wheelchairs are secured properly, but also doesn't hesistate to complain to their supervisor if one of you offends them and has on at least one occasion told one of you off in a tirade, that may or may not have included obscenities, in front of a bus full of passengers at 99th Street Transit Center all because one of you dared to poke his head in the bus and warn this operator about a traffic problem.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the coach operator who got told off at 99th Street-didn't bother to report this to his supervisor!!!! Many of the drivers know about it, many passengers know about it but the bosses don't. Gotta be loyal to the brotherhood...

Why was this not reported? If one of my co-workers did this to me and was known to be as mentally unstable as Psycho is, I'd report them. There are some people who are not worthy of your most vigorous defense when they commit some act that gets them brought up on a formal complaint.

And this is not the only C-Tran driver who has been protected. There is a male driver who women know better than to say their phone numbers out loud for fear of getting obscene phone calls. There's another driver who is just an odd duck, that his fellow drivers have always found more than a little strange. This guy got romantically involved with a passenger, got her pregnant and has subsequently married her. He still acts as odd as he ever has, so his new marriage hasn't stabilized him. I've seen him taking some sort of pills behind the wheel of his moving bus, they don't look like vitamins. I tried reporting it to C-Tran only to be told that there aren't any cameras that see the driver behind the wheel, so they have no way of knowing if he was taking pills or not.

I do not understand how for example it would weaken the ability of the union to defend a driver not deserving of termination or suspension to let some of these bad drivers who do deserve termination or longer term suspension slip through the cracks. You need to draw some lines of distinction. It shouldn't be all or nothing. Common sense needs to enter into the equation sometimes. It's my experience with jobs I've worked at and in talking with C-Tran operators, keeping the Bozos around does cause morale issues.

Make no mistake, thanks to the handful of high profile Tri Met drivers who've gotten themselves on the news over the past year or so, you are all now under a microscope when it comes to your behavior. How long is it before Psycho goes off on one of her well known tirades and someone whips out a cell phone with video/sound capabilities and calls Fox 12? When this does happen it is going to make each and every one of you look bad. Not just passengers but the general public will pass judgement that you must all be like her. Considering in a little over a year from now that same public is going to be asked to vote to save many of your jobs, is defending this operator or any others who might do something especially bad really worth it?