BY SUSAN BROWN, Times of Northwest Indiana
sbrown@nwitimes.com
A $1.3 million contract between the Northwest Indiana Regional Bus Authority and Northwest Indiana Community Action Corp. will continue even as NWICA presses forward with plans to discontinue its demand bus service, officials said last week.
The RBA and NWICA entered into a two-year contract to enhance NWICA's call center and dispatching technology earlier this year. The goal is to centralize information and dispatching services for the move toward regionalization.
"It is still their position and our position that we will continue to contract with NWICA for that service," RBA Director Dennis Rittenmeyer said last week.
But given the disintegrating bus services in urban Lake County, NWICA Executive Director Gary Olund said some things are certainly up in the air.
Of the $1.3 million contract, which ends in early 2010, NWICA will have received $307,417 by the end of the year, said Tim Brown, RBA executive director. The bulk of the contract, $925,167, is aimed at the fixed-route conversion expected next year. Another $102,000 will conclude the contract in early 2010.
"Should the RBA wish it, we will continue with the call center," Olund said. "As far as dispatching, it depends on what dispatching needs to be done."
"The call center is an information provision," said Ken Dallmeyer, RBA project manager. "The plan is to provide detailed information about all the services, including NICTD (Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District) and the (Gary) airport."
Dallmeyer said the dispatch service currently matches riders only with demand-response bus transportation. NWICA is dispatching rides for its own demand service and North Township's Dial-A-Ride. The plan under the RBA contract is to extend the computerized service to South Lake County Community Services in Crown Point, the Porter County Council on Aging in Valparaiso and Opportunity Enterprises, also in Valparaiso.
Fixed-route bus services are included in a future phase still to be initiated, Dallmeyer said. Those plans include automatic vehicle location equipment and the potential for doing passenger counts and audio visual enhancements for riders, such as alerting passengers to the next stop.
The RBA entered into the contract with NWICA, the largest demand response service in the region, because NWICA had the core infrastructure in place, Dallmeyer said. "It's mostly a matter of expanding their computerized dispatch," he said.
After being based in Hammond for more than 20 years, NWICA relocated in July 2007 to Schererville where the call center and the dispatch service are housed.
Olund said the changes provided for under the RBA contract, which mostly involve the purchase of equipment and software, are 30 to 60 days behind schedule. "Not because of funding but because of the readiness of other providers," he said.
"We're moving forward on it," Olund said. "We've got a contract and will meet its rules. Should circumstances change, we'll sit down with the RBA and see what their wishes are and make an assessment. We certainly won't be purchasing equipment that won't be used."
Meanwhile, Olund said plans to discontinue NWICA's bus service in January haven't changed despite the RBA recently being instructed by the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority to take over both fixed-route and demand response bus service.
"It does not change anything," Olund said. "It's encouraging that folks are discussing a larger solution to the transportation needs in Northwest Indiana, particularly Lake and Porter counties. However, it has not resulted in any additional funds to continue our service at this point. That's our reality."