Previous Story
Call-A-Ride resumes operations
|
Posted on Oct 04 2005
Call-A-Ride finally resumed operations yesterday but with only one of two vehicles serving the Saipan community.
“We are already picking up people,” said Aging Center director Joseph Palacios.
The Call-A-Ride service, which reached its end of operations with Pacific Development Inc. last Friday, was transferred to the Office on Aging. However, the vehicle’s insurance expired that same day.
Palacios said the insurance and registration of the vehicle had been fixed Monday afternoon.
The Call-A-Ride service vehicle was turned over to the Aging Office on Friday and it was late in the afternoon when they discovered that the insurance of the vehicle had expired on the same day.
Palacios said they started with one vehicle only since the other one has been in the repair shop for over six months now. He said it would be ideal if both vehicles are serving the community.
He said the Office of the Governor is temporarily taking care of the fuel cost for the operations.
Palacios earlier said that the Aging Center will take over the Call-A-Ride operations for only two to three months, just to ensure that regular service to its clients would not be interrupted.
Until the Council for Developmental Disabilities finds another private business entity to handle its operations, the Aging Center will ferry clients with disabilities around Saipan, he said.
CDD executive director Antonio Chong said that three private entities have pending proposals for the program. Chong said there are 200 people who benefit from the Call-a-Ride program every month.
He said that PDI spent some $9,000 a month on personnel, fuel, and maintenance to sustain the service. This monthly expense would be up due to the high fuel costs at this time, he added.
PDI earlier notified the council that it would stop providing transportation service to people with disabilities as part of its contingency plan for Japan Airline’s withdrawal this month.
