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Boys & Girls Club of Federal Way and Auburn receive retired King County van
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| Councilman Pete von Reichbauer, along with Shelly Peoria and the Boys and Girls club staff and members celebrate the retired van donation. |
Metropolitan King County Council passed legislation transferring passenger vans to nonprofit organizations and local governments that meet the needs of low-income, elderly, disabled and young people in our community. The Boys and Girls Club of Federal Way and Auburn received their retired county van in late February of this year.
“King County’s retired van donation program is a wonderful way for the County to assist those non-profit organizations who play a vital role in elevating the quality of life for our youth in our community,” said von Reichbauer. “I visit the Boys and Girls Club often and it is easy to see just how valuable additional transportation options are to this organization. I know that this retired county van will be put to good use.”
The retired King County passenger van will be used to shuttle students between the Boys and Girls Club and fourteen different elementary, middle and high schools within the Federal Way Public School District. The van will also be used to shuttle high school students to a tutoring program offered by the EX3 Ron Sandwith Teen Center, a facility also operated by the Boys and Girls Club. While not being used to transport kids for schooling and tutoring purposes, the van will be used for field trips to places like the Seattle Center, the Museum of Glass in Tacoma, local beaches and parks, and many more educational and recreational destinations around the Puget Sound region.
“The contribution of this retired King County van provides a huge opportunity for us to help more kids,” said Shelley Puariea, Executive Director of the Boys and Girls Club of Federal Way and Auburn and the EX3 Ron Sandwith Teen Center. “Many kids have difficulties getting to our facilities, and this van will help provide more access to more kids in South King County.”
Since 1996 the King County Council has distributed over 260 retired vans to various non-profit organizations. After eight years in the King County Fleet Division, the vans are retired and prepared for donation.
In 1995 King County Councilmember Pete von Reichbauer began the program after noticing a substantial number of King County vans sitting idle (as much as 30% of the total 741 vehicle fleet). Pete found out that due to an inefficient bulk purchasing policy, the County was housing over $3.8 million worth of excess, unused vehicles.
As chair of the Budget and Fiscal Management Committee, Pete responded by proposing a more cost-effective method of procuring smaller shipments of vans as needed and extending the retirement age of the vehicles from five to eight years.
Pete proposed that a portion of the significant savings of the new policies go towards a program that would donate the retired vans to local non-profits throughout the region. The county van pool program began in 1996 as a pilot project; and has now has now been institutionalized as part of the Metro Transit van pool program.