Submitted photos

Harney County’s transportation program now boasts 10 vehicles.

At the end of October, Darlene Needham, transportation manager for the Harney County Senior and Community Services Center, was recognized statewide as an Outstanding Public Transportation Employee by Oregon Transit.

Needham began working for the Harney County Senior and Community Services Center in 1983 as a housekeeper and kitchen aide. Part of her duties included what was known at that time as “chore service,” which at times consisted of driving seniors to appointments, shopping, and running errands. Thus began her lifelong service in the transportation world.

In February 1994, Needham was officially given the title of “driver.” She recalls at that time there was one older Ford van known as “The Blue Goose.” She dispatched, drove, and completed all of the paperwork at the time. She was the senior transportation department of 1994.

Later in 1994, Harney County obtained its first Oregon Department of Transportation grant for a lift-equipped bus, and Harney County’s official Dial-A-Ride program began. Needham was the only driver. Eventually, a dispatcher came on to the staff, and Needham continued to drive and back up the dispatcher as needed.

At the turn of the century, Needham took a couple of years off from transportation, but was back behind the wheel by 2004.  By then, the program had three buses and a full-time dispatcher/supervisor. Needham continued to drive for the program and covered dispatch as needed.

In November 2009, the previous supervisor retired, and Needham accepted

the position as transportation manager. At the time, the program was still pretty small. There were three vehicles and three drivers running 8-5 Monday through Friday.

Needham always had much bigger plans for her frontier community. She recognized the importance of reliable transportation for a community to grow, and she waited for that door to open. With an organizational management change, that door did open, and Needham brought her program right through it.

With the addition of a fourth vehicle and two new staff members, the growth began. Needham helped develop a logo for the full organization and a spin-off for Dial-A-Ride. She encouraged the purchase of “uniforms” for drivers, including hats. She also helped distribute a community survey to determine what the community wanted most from the service. Available public transportation, seven days a week, was born.

Running seven days a week, Needham needed more vehicles and more staff. Her request for both spurred a Dial-A-Ride staff of 11 members and seven vehicles in service. Needham began cross training staff to dispatch and to cover some paperwork. She encouraged staff to accept the changes coming, and though she is the first to admit she is no computer wizard, supported the move from paper and phone to electronic dispatch software and tablets, which allowed real time dispatching capabilities and cut her phone time in half.

Needham wanted to grow the services her program could provide and began working with the brokerage to obtain more out-of-town medical rides. Dial-A-Ride now accepts these unexpected out-of-town trips, and often has staff and vehicles in other communities up to five times a week.

Needham directly manages the largest staff within the organization, with as many as 14 employees at any one time. As a testament to her management style, her staff nominated her for Harney County Boss of the Year in 2016. She was awarded the honor at the local Chamber Banquet, which was attended by much of her staff, coworkers, and her supervisor.

She believed that our community would be well-served with a deviated fixed route addition to the services. Late 2017, she grabbed her boss by the hand, and they went on to develop a route that had an hour turn-around. She worked and fine-tuned it with the help of the Region V Coordinator, Frank Thomas. In June 2018, the first version of the brochure was developed, the service was advertised, and the route began. Needham continued to advocate for the service with her doubtful staff and her community. When the first month came in at 45 rides, Needham stayed positive and never gave up on her dream to provide this transportation opportunity to her community. At the six-month mark, Needham continued to advocate, and no one celebrated more than she did the first month that the route broke 100 riders. The service is now well on its way to completing an 800-ride month on the route.

With more and bigger buses in the fleet, Needham advocated for a two-bay addition to the bus barn to keep buses out of the weather and in peak condition much longer.

Needham has been at the helm of Harney County’s transportation program for the better part of 25 years, and it has grown from a one-woman show to a 10-vehicle, 14-person, seven-days-a-week program that runs both a door-to-door service and a deviated fixed route.

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Deviated Route System

The Deviated Route System runs on a one-hour headway (that is approximately 30 minutes each direction) from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. to 7 p.m., and a 90-minute headway (approximately 45 minutes in each direction) from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. Monday-Friday. The service lines begin at the Harney County Senior Center and end at Hines Park. Morning and early afternoon routes serve Burns and Hines. Late afternoon and evening routes incorporate the Burns Paiute Reservation Monday-Friday. Saturday bus service is every hour from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with one hour out of service from noon to 1 p.m.

Deviations up to .25 mile off the route are available by appointment. Please allow 10 minutes after the scheduled stop time, as situations arise during route that may cause delays.

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Door-to-Door Transportation Service

Scheduled door-to-door service allows passengers to schedule rides to their destination. Drivers will stop at the requested location and will help passengers onto the vehicle and off of the vehicle once they arrive at their destination.

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Bus barn and bus stops

The new addition to the bus barn will have room for two additional buses and will include an indoor wash station. The project was funded by federal public transportation dollars.

There are 24 bus stops located around the community. For a list of bus stop locations, stop by the Harney County Senior and Community Services Center at 17 S. Alder in Burns, or ask one of the drivers.

“These accomplishments have made us a ‘shining star’ on the eastern side of the state,” noted Angie Lamborn, executive director for the Harney County Senior and Community Services Center. “We are the only town on the eastern side with public transportation seven days a week.”

These are accomplishments worth noting wherever you may be.