Rainier School Board approves transportation rate increase

The Rainier School District Board of Directors voted unanimously to approve a transportation rate increase for 2025-26 at its monthly meeting on Wednesday, May 21.
During his presentation, Transportation Director Bob Marney said the school’s current bus charter rate is $1 per mile for operation costs and $32 per hour to cover driver costs.

“Transportation funding is to be used for getting students to and from school. Any other cost must be reimbursed within the department,” Marney said. “We’re strictly funded (kindergarten) through (12th grade) to and from school.”

Marney recommended raising the mileage rate to $2.11 per mile based on averages over the last two years, which factored in maintenance, parts, supplies, insurance, fuel and other costs divided by the total amount of miles driven in a year.

For the wage rate, Marney recommended an increase to $39.30 per hour based on the average wage of all drivers for the 2025-26 year.

“This is based off the increases we’ve had in parts and fuel from the last two years,” Marney said of the rate increases.

Marney noted that the athletic department would likely be most affected by the increases, since they perform the majority of travel outside of the regular times designated for transportation funding.

“One thing, though, I would say is that Rob (Henry) has done a great job of eliminating the amount of using buses and using more of the vans so it is cheaper for us,” Superintendent Bryon Bahr said of Rainier’s athletic director. “He’s pretty cautious about that.”

Marney recommended increasing the per diem rate for vans and cars from its current rate of 50 cents per mile to 70 cents per mile to match the IRS’s standard mileage rate for business use.

Because teachers and coaches typically drive the vans, there is no hourly rate billed for drivers.

Bahr said that programs like the athletic department may have to fundraise more to make up for the cost of fuel and maintenance for the vans, which the district ends up covering, especially during the summer.

The motion to approve the rate increases passed unanimously.

The board unanimously passed a motion to approve the federally funded Career and Technical Education (CTE) Program for 2025-26. During the meeting, CTE Director Sandy Rossmaier recapped the year’s program, which is further subdivided into five separate programs: Agriculture, Business, Family and Consumer Science, AG-Shop and STEM (robotics).

Additionally, the board unanimously approved the Associated Student Body (ASB) calendar.
As Rossmaier explained: “Every single student group, whether it’s the senior class, the football team, or the Spanish club, they all have to complete a budget sheet that asks and says, ‘These are the fundraisers we want to do, this is how much money we want to make, this is how we want to spend that money, and this is how much we want to make sure that we save for next year.’ So that’s kind of what our fundraising calendar is about.”

The ASB budget will be approved along with the rest of the district’s budget at a later date.
In other news, We Love Rainier donated $500 to cover food service debt for students that were unable to pay their remaining balance. A $500 donation was also made in honor of the late Peyton Poler for the Elementary STEM Program.

During the district’s financial report, business manager Debi Holmes highlighted the recent influx of money from the capital levy.

“Capital projects I want to point out just because, you know, it’s our first year to get that capital levy,” Holmes said. “So our big amount came in for our capital levy, and for the month of April, we got in $445,000, which total to date for capital levy dollars is $522,915, which, of course, is great, because we’ve started our track project.”

On May 28, the district will begin resurfacing the track at Rainier High School using funds gained from the capital levy. All gates and access to the stadium will be closed. The estimated time to completion is two months.

Holmes added that the district’s “bottom dollar” for capital projects is $725,123.

The public budget hearing is set for July 30 at 5:30 p.m. According to Holmes, the budget will be available online for review.

The board of directors set June 16 as their date to review the superintendent’s contract.
The next Rainier School Board meeting is scheduled for June 18 at 6 p.m.