Employees, Labor Problems
Virginia Overland Transportation was staffed by many employees with prior public service expertise, including current and former GRTC and Richmond Public Schools employees, as well as some from other local public school divisions and retirees from military service and other organizations. The wide range of services and bus equipment combined to attract bus enthusiasts as employees. At its peak in 1984, the company was operating 135 revenue vehicles, and had over 175 employees.
In October 1986, some of the employees at the largest operation in the Tri-Cities area and the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) petitioned the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) for labor union elections. The company management felt that a unionized operation could not compete with the advantages of school district self-operation of school buses because public employee unions of school bus employees are generally not recognized by local and state government in Virginia, a right-to-work state. (In 1976, a similar unionization attempt of school bus drivers working for ARA Transportation, another school bus contractor, by the Teamsters Union in Norfolk, had resulted in considerable violence and several almost new Wayne Lifeguard buses were burned by protesters. The unionization attempt there essentially failed after the Virginia State Police assisted in ensuring that the Norfolk City Public Schools bus operations were not interrupted by the protesters).
In an attempt to avoid an election, Virginia Overland management appealed the request for election. NLRB hearings were held on several issues in the fall of 1986 and early 1987 in Richmond and Petersburg. However, the company was unsuccessful in blocking an election. Following an NLRB determination that an election be held, approximately 75 of Virginia Overland's hourly transportation and maintenance employees voted at the Petersburg terminal in May 1987. The election results were to remain non-union.
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