Agencies work to combine services

Dec 18, 2006 11:12:34

By SUMMER WALLACE-MINGER, Staff writer Herald-Star STEUBENVILLE — A group of area agencies providing transportation services gathered at the Jefferson County Job and Family Services Department Thursday to discuss the coordination of transportation services throughout the county. Mike Paprocki, Brooke-Hancock-Jefferson Metropolitan Commission transportation planner, said a federal transportation bill put into law in August 2005 required agencies to collaborate on a community transportation plan in order to continue receiving federal money, including some funding for the transportation of the elderly and disabled. Several agencies were represented at the meeting, including the Family and Children First Council, Prime Time Agency on Aging, Jefferson County Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, Jefferson Community College, Jefferson Behavioral Health System, Independent Living Center, Jefferson County Regional Planning Commission, Job and Family Services and its children services division, Jefferson County Community Action Council, Steel Valley Regional Transportation Authority, BHJ and Checker Transportation. Paprocki said he would like to see if one of the agencies had the capability to be a “feeder agency,” where residents needing transportation could be referred to a participating agency best serving their needs. He noted the group may want to set up a dispatch center in the future. “It would be sort of like what the 911 center does for the fire departments,” he said of the proposed dispatch center. He added there were a variety of ways the assembled agencies could assist one another, including cost and vehicle sharing or entering into cooperative maintenance or fuel purchasing agreements. Paprocki spoke to the group about C.H.A.N.G.E. Inc. and the Hancock County Sheltered Workshop, which are working cooperatively in Hancock County. He said Change Inc. had been providing commuting services for workers at Mountaineer Racetrack and Gaming Resort, with two passengers in a 12-passenger van. The Sheltered Workshop wanted to expand its laundry services, but didn’t have enough transportation for the nine additional workers needed, said Paprocki. The two agencies agreed on a per-trip price for the Sheltered Workshop employees and C.H.A.N.G.E. Inc. agreed to provide transportation services for the nine workshop employees. “That’s how it is working on the other side of the river,” said Paprocki.