A week after seeking the Jones County Board of Supervisors’ permission to modify staff hours, JETS Director Jamie Ginter met with the board during their June 21 meeting concerning increasing ride rates due to the price of fuel.
The last time JETS increased its rates was Jan. 1, 2018. Since then, the rates have been $3 each way within a city/town, an extra stop was $1, $5 between cities/towns, out-of-county was $25 an hour (if there was no wait time).
Ginter proposed, and the board approved, the following new rates, effective Aug. 1, 2022:
• $4 each way within a city/town
• $2 per extra stop, including Senior Dining sites
• $6 between cities/towns
• $30 per hour for out-of-county trips
Ginter said she’s been in talks with other transportation services in other counties such as Iowa, Washington, and Benton who have also been forced to address the rising gas prices.
“Benton County already increased their rates and it’s more than ours,” said Ginter.
ECICOG partnered with Jones County years ago to provide a local transportation service. Ginter has also been working with ECICOG on the rate increases.
“We need to update our software, too,” she told the board, so that the software jives with the new rates. Ginter felt this task could be accomplished by August.
Supervisor Ned Rohwedder asked if JETS was seeing a deficit.
“We probably will be with fuel the way it is and the age of the buses and price for repairs,” offered Ginter. “It’s not a huge number of repairs.”
She said not using the JETS vehicles extensively during the pandemic helped with repair costs.
Supervisor John Schlarmann asked if some riders could submit their trips to their insurance companies, especially for the out-of-county rides. Ginter said many JETS users do submit to Medicaid for reimbursement.
“I don’t want to see people put in a bad spot,” commented Schlarmann.
“This will not affect the majority of our people,” Ginter said. “Medicaid reimbursements haven’t changed yet.”
Supervisor Joe Oswald asked Ginter if she considered a 50-cent increase versus a dollar or more.
“I thought about it, but then our drivers would have to deal with making change on the buses,” explained Ginter.