SSTA director talks staffing, wages and innovation to support transit for an aging Vermont

COLCHESTER — Nestled in the heart of town is the headquarters for a service which is well-known, though very unique, in Chittenden County: Special Services Transportation Agency. 

The basic principles of the organization haven’t changed since the program’s inception, SSTA director Adam Lawrence told the Sun. The nonprofit provides specialized transportation for individuals with specialized needs, mainly elderly folks and people with disabilities, county-wide. 

SSTA’s largest program is the Americans with Disabilities Act program, which provides  a complimentary, accessible transportation alternative to traditional public transit bus routes. The program is a contracted partnership between SSTA and Green Mountain Transit. 

All GMT rides and ADA alternatives have been fare-free since the start of the pandemic. However, public transportation fares will likely resume in the next few months for both services. 

“We have built a fantastic reputation as sort of a family-focused and family-feel service provider,” Lawrence said. “Meaning that our drivers are really friends and build relationships with the people we serve.” 

SSTA’s patrons really rely on the service for social-, medical- and grocery-related needs, and riders have an unusual opportunity to be picked up right at their front door, and to connect and build relationships with SSTA drivers. 

In return, clients tend to show SSTA a deep appreciation. For example, a number of clients send holiday-season goodies to SSTA drivers to show their gratitude. 

SSTA has about 50 drivers currently working a 50 vehicle-fleet with 30 being lift-equipped and wheelchair accessible, and the organization averages around 700 rides provided daily — though SSTA has had trouble finding and hiring drivers lately to keep up, Lawrence said. 

“We're not immune to the normal [staffing and labor] challenges that every business in our country really has,” Lawrence said. “For the last year, we've really been challenged with finding drivers. We haven't had to cut services or do anything like that, but it's been a challenge.” 

A lot of SSTA’s drivers have been picking up extra hours of work and “working to the bone, burning the candle at both ends,” to prevent cutting back services, he said, and the demand is growing, given Vermont’s rapidly aging population. 

However, in instances where drivers are few and ride requests are plentiful, SSTA always grants urgent ride requests, such as medical, over recreational ones. Requests can be made by those eligible via a call to the SSTA customer service office 24 hours in advance. 

“SSTA will never turn down critical care rides,” Lawrence said. “Those types of rides, critical medical appointments, it just won't happen. We'll do everything we can.” 

Aside from navigating hiring challenges, as many employers are locally and nationwide, Lawrence is pleased with the accomplishments he’s made since the Sun’s last story on the organization — published just after Lawrence began his term there as director and just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. 

“When I started here, I recognized right away that our wage structure and the pay to pay for our drivers, in my mind and in the mind of our board, was out of whack,” Lawrence said. “We definitely needed to readdress and reassess what we were paying our drivers and that proved to be critical, particularly through the pandemic.” 

As social distancing restrictions lifted, call volume increased, but thanks to wage increases, Lawrence said SSTA maintained its entire driving staff throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In the very early days of Lawrence’s time at SSTA at the start of 2020, he instituted a wage increase to $16 per hour minimum across the board to bring pay up to where the market showed it should be, he said. However, since that time he’s implemented three additional wage increases to keep up with the market and increased cost of living, now starting drivers at $22 hourly. 

Additionally under Lawrence, SSTA has undergone a brand refresh. 

“We've overhauled the look of the van,” he said. “We had a graphic designer who was a Colchester resident with us to come up with some new logos and images and tagline and really kind of freshen up the image of our vehicles.” 

“Our vehicles are rolling billboards,” he added. “They're around town every day in front of thousands of eyes.” 

Not only did SSTA spruce up its vans, it also installed new SSTA building signage. 

“What we are most focused on right now as an organization, is continuing to advocate for our staff members and make sure that the drivers, being the most important people we employ, that those drivers are able to continue to drive,” Lawrence told the Sun. 

Costs have been “skyrocketing” across the board in the realm of transportation, he said, and from a legislative standpoint, there are many major challenges to overcome in the next few years to ensure SSTA service offerings can continue at full capacity.  

“Financing funding for transportation across the country is in a tricky place right now,” he said. “There's just not as much funding there.” 

There is, however, an enormous focus on cleaner emissions and a shift from combustion engines to electric vehicles in Vermont — though lift-equipped vehicles aren’t super battery-friendly, so Lawrence expects SSTA to be toward the tail end of that transition. 

“But those technologies are coming,” he said. “Our organization is really trying to get ahead of preparing for the transition to electric vehicles in our fleet. So we're doing some work right now with VTrans to assess and prepare what that looks like for our organization.” 

He suspects in the next five years, SSTA will start to see some electric vehicles enter its fleet, and gradually work to transition the fleet fully from high carbon output vehicles to electric, which will benefit the environment and in the long-run, its efficiency will reduce the taxpayers' burden. 

SSTA will also transition to new software in the near future to make ride scheduling more logical and efficient as well as more cost-efficient, reassessing routes to reduce the fleet’s fuel waste.