Some wheelchair-bound METS users wait hours for rides because of staffing shortage

EVANSVILLE — When METS Mobility stranded Megan Durre at Ivy Tech Community College earlier this month, her nine-hour day got even longer.

Durre arrives on campus at 8 a.m., and her hope is to leave at 4:30. But as someone who has used a wheelchair all her life, she relies on METS to make that happen. More and more often it hasn't.

That could mean waiting three hours past her scheduled pickup time, hoping security lets her stay inside the building to watch for her ride. Or in the case of a few Wednesdays ago, calling her dad to come pick her up when METS doesn't show up at all.

That’s just one of the many issues METS Mobility users are facing as the operation deals with a lack of drivers, resulting in extended wait times and canceled rides.

Unreliability has forced riders to look for other modes of transportation, something more complicated for those who use wheelchairs.

Extended wait times and missed pickups

Durre has a set schedule with school and Easterseals for therapy. But even when she calls METS the requested two or three weeks in advance, there sometimes aren’t rides available.

There could be a drop-off time available but no pickup, or vice versa.

“‘We can get you there, but we can’t get you home,’” Durre said. “So, I’m spending the night at Ivy Tech?”

She’s taking an Excel class this summer, which can occasionally require three keystrokes at a time to complete a task. Durre isn’t able to do that on her own, as she has limited use of her arms and hands, so it’s better for her to spend the day on campus where she can have a friend help her.

“I could tell someone I can’t be there,” she said. “But it’s honestly depressing knowing there is that transportation, and that it’s not always reliable.”

Durre isn't alone

Megan Seiler shared that sentiment. Still, some people tell her she should be grateful for the resources that are available to her.

She's happy the service exists. But right now she isn’t able to use it for fear of waiting three hours for the bus to show up, or receiving a call at her pickup time with a message that her ride has been canceled.

Those three-hour wait times also aren't reciprocated. METS drivers have a typical five-minute wait time. Riders may wait hours, but if they aren't outside within five minutes of pickup, the driver has likely left.

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“We have just as much right to be upset that they’re not reliable,” she said.

Seiler, who was born with Spina Bifida, said she used the service for school and doctor’s appointments, but right now she’s relying on family and her caregiver to help her get where she needs to go.

With METS, she’s had ride cancellations the night before, the morning of, a couple hours before and even at the time of her scheduled pickup.

Having chronic illness, Seiler said it's hard to have things scheduled two weeks in advance. There may be a follow-up appointment scheduled a lot sooner than that. But she still calls to check sometimes about openings when something comes up on short notice. She's never had any luck getting a ride.

"With chronic illness, life is unpredictable," she said.

Seiler understands the issue is rooted in a lack of drivers. The dispatchers are even driving routes right now, and the reliability has only been getting worse.

“They’ve just got to find a way through it,” she said. “They just can’t keep doing what they’re doing.”

Efforts to hire more drivers

Evansville’s director of transportation, Todd Robertson, recently got permission from Evansville City Council to establish a certified driver program onsite at METS. The hope is this will make it possible to hire people with the incentive of onsite training.

Robertson told City Council that METS is currently manipulating routes in response to drivers leaving for other opportunities.

The new position would be hired in at $55,000 a year, and would be responsible for training those looking to earn their commercial driver's license. The job listing was posted July 10.

On the mobility side, Robertson told the Courier & Press there are six drivers, 14 shy of what would be considered a full staff.

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There are two dispatchers – fully staffed would be three – and both are driving from "time to time" to help offset the current need, Robertson said. Fixed route drivers, as well as maintenance shop personnel, are also asked to drive on their days off.

Robertson said along with the new CDL training planned internally for METS, new drivers are also being incentivized with a $2,500 sign-on bonus.

Other options are limited

Aside from METS, there isn't other public transportation in the city. This leaves anyone looking for another option to turn to potentially expensive alternatives, such as privatized mobility services.

Durre used Garling Mobility as her alternative after METS told her a whole week was already full when she called, with appropriate notice, to request rides.

Garling has been nice, respectful and on time. Even 30 minutes early, she said. In Durre’s case, transportation was added as a service to her vocational therapy plan when she reported there were issues with METS for a week.

But not everyone would have that option. They could face out-of-pocket costs for the base rental rate, as well a per-mile cost most of the area companies use. And wheelchair users have a higher rate than ambulatory renters. If a person doesn’t want to use private transportation, or can’t afford to, they may have to turn to friends or family for rides.

Both Durre and Seiler have limitations as far as that goes, since their wheelchairs don’t allow just any type of vehicle as an option.

Durre uses an electric wheelchair, while Seiler does not. But Seiler said that doesn't mean just any vehicle is an option. Her chair is still difficult to fold down and place in a trunk or backseat.

It’s also frustrating to have to ask for help with something like getting to school or a doctor’s appointment when reliable public transportation would make that unnecessary.

“When (METS doesn’t) have the availability or the space or whatever you want to call it, it kind of makes me frustrated,” Durre said.

She wonders what would happen if she didn’t have people in her life who could drop what they’re doing to go to her house and get her mobility van to come back and pick her up.

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“It’s mentally taxing,” she said.

Seiler has been living on her own for over a year now, and has already dealt with issues in her apartment complex. Now she's dealing with problems at METS.

She wanted independence, but a lack of public transportation restrains her ability to live how she'd like. She said society has to figure out how to work with people living with a disability.

"I know that as a person with a disability that doesn't make me any less worthy of a life that is free and independent, she said. "And happy and healthy."

This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: Evansville METS bus routes struggling with staffing for mobility service