A bus driver shortage at the MBTA led the agency to incorporate a commercial driver’s license permit program into new hire onboarding, a move the authority’s top hiring official said helped boost recruitment efforts and bring in more candidates.
The workforce challenge has plagued the MBTA since last year, where officials have turned to sign-on bonuses and hiked pay for operators in an attempt to attract more people. But even if applicants made it all the way to a job offer, the commercial driver’s license requirement was still a “barrier to entry,” said Gil Alzate, director of talent acquisition at the MBTA.
The MBTA started by offering a “CDL familiarization course” hosted twice a month on Tuesdays before offering an opportunity to obtain a commercial learner’s permit program as part of new-hire training, Alzate said.
“So now we hire folks, clean driving record, they meet all our policy requirements, and we embed them into the program. The first two weeks are targeted around getting your permit. So again, the takeaway for us there was showing that we have skin in the game. We understand that again, it’s a difficult job but what do we bring … to the table?”
The MBTA would often interview bus driver candidates, offer them the job, and tell them to “come back when you have your permit,” Alzate said. Recruiters would lose candidates as a result, Alzate said.
“The moment we started to incorporate the permit piece into our training program, we saw our classes double,” Alzate said. “A year ago, we were starting classes of nine, 10, 12 individuals. We started a class this past Monday, 34 individuals. The bulk of them, those that don’t have a permit, are going to be going through our permit program.”
The bus driver shortage was so bad at the MBTA that the agency cut service on 43 bus routes in August 2022. The reductions are still in effect today, MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo said.
Pesaturo said there were 1,611 active bus operators as of June 29, an increase from late May, when there were 1,536 active bus drivers.
The MBTA is not the only transit agency experiencing workforce challenges.
Regional transportation authority officials said Wednesday they are also finding it hard to hire workers, an issue that can result in less service for residents across the state.
Transportation Secretary Gina Fiandaca said the state understands “how critical [RTA] workforce challenges are” and contracted with the marketing firm ASG to support hiring efforts.
“They’ve already helped you develop some digital billboards along our highways and getting the word out on radio about public transit and posting advertisements in other places so that we can get some folks enthusiastic about working in this sector,” Fiandaca told RTA administrators.
The state inked a nearly $636,000 contract with ASG for a “RTA recruitment employee campaign,” according to a copy provided to the Herald on Thursday.
MetroWest Regional Transit Authority Administrator Jim Nee said several RTA officials have been working with ASG to come up with unified messaging that can be broadcasted across the state in different formats.
“We want to make sure that that messaging is very representative of the communities that we serve and the people that we’re trying to recruit,” Nee said. “So right now we’re just finalizing the last bits of the creative and the last bits of the ad buy with them. That’s probably getting finalized in the next couple of days or hours actually.