{"id":24860,"date":"2024-11-13T22:39:30","date_gmt":"2024-11-14T05:39:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-bus-delays-monday-and-tuesday-attributed-to-driver-shortage\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T23:03:43","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:03:43","slug":"cortez-bus-delays-monday-and-tuesday-attributed-to-driver-shortage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-bus-delays-monday-and-tuesday-attributed-to-driver-shortage\/","title":{"rendered":"Cortez bus delays Monday and Tuesday attributed to driver shortage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=b1f0ce47-1a75-4f9d-933a-505d70ed1655&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1333\" height=\"641\" alt=\"The Montezuma-Cortez School District RE-1 released a letter Thursday informing families of district COVID-19 cases.\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">The Montezuma-Cortez School District RE-1 released a letter Thursday informing families of district COVID-19 cases.<\/span><span class=\"credit\">Erika Alvero<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>The Montezuma-Cortez school district experienced bus delays Monday and Tuesday, and these delays were attributed to a bus driver shortage that is also affecting other schools in the state.<\/p>\n<p>Mesa Elementary\u2019s \u201cSheep\u201d bus and Kemper Elementary\u2019s \u201cDog\u201d bus were delayed an hour, while Lewis-Arriola Elementary\u2019s \u201cElk\u201d and \u201cSwan\u201d buses were delayed by an hour and a half.<\/p>\n<p>The \u201cKitty Bus,\u201d which serves multiple schools, was also delayed by an hour and a half.<\/p>\n<p>The district said that while the bus driver shortage is causing these delays, \u201call trained and available staff are assisting while new drivers receive training.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Superintendent Tom Burris told <em id=\"emphasis-d90a9ee3c8e490448ccf0307e626cfcf\">The<\/em> <em id=\"emphasis-d870e92e928add1227fbef7dc024b7f3\">Journal<\/em> that they have had many transportation employees move or retire, contributing to the shortage. They are, however, looking for drivers to fill open positions.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe, as many other districts, are dealing with a shortage of drivers,\u201d Burris said. \u201cThis is true across the state of Colorado.\u00a0We are actively recruiting drivers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Assistant Superintendent Eddie Ramirez is driving a minibus, and Burris shared that he is also preparing for the CLD test to help fill the gaps.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have held a CDL in the past and I have driven a school bus,\u201d Burris said.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the buses being delayed, Burris said they have still been able to hold classes on time, so far.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSince there are students who walk to school and students who have parents drop them off, we are holding classes on time,\u201d Burris said.\u00a0\u201cAt Lewis, there were only six students who rode the bus yesterday morning.\u00a0The others arrived at school on time with parents.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The district is offering new drivers a $1,500 signing bonus, and they will be paid $19 an hour during training and to \u201cstart their driving career.\u201d The top rate is $26.60 per hour.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>district is recruiting drivers, and other staff fill in when needed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24861,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,28,60,216,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-24860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-montezuma-cortez-school-district-re-1","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24860"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24860\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78705,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24860\/revisions\/78705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24860"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=24860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}