Shrinking, changing the vehicle fleet

Posted on: August 1, 2017 | Bob Frye | Comments

The Fish and Boat Commission uses its stocking trucks for decades. Some other vehicles, though, are proving more expendable.
Photo: PA Fish and Boat Commission

Less might be more. It will definitely be different.

The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission is trimming – and changing – its vehicle fleet.

That’s partly by demand, partly by choice.

Demand

First, the demand.

Last fall the Pennsylvania auditor general’s office tasked state agencies with counting how many vehicles they had. Some had more vehicles than employees.

“We’re guilty. We do,” said Brian Barner, deputy executive director of the Fish and Boat Commission.

It had 376 employees as of Oct. 1. It had 420 vehicles, counting only those registered as road worthy.

All-terrain vehicles, tractors and the like don’t count.

Few of those vehicles are new, Barner stressed. The average age of a commission vehicle is 11 years, and the average mileage is more than 100,000.

Under state Department of General Services guidelines, nearly half – or 191 of the 420 – are eligible to be replaced, Barner said. There are no plans to go that route.

The average maintenance cost of a commission vehicle is only about $1,800, and the commission typically uses vehicles as long as possible, he noted.

Hatchery stocking trucks are an example, said Brian Wisner, chief of the hatchery division.

Those trucks, he said, are typically used 25 to 30 years. The commission puts between 200,000 and 300,000 miles on each, he noted.

Still, the commission is working to reduce its fleet. Barner said each bureau within the commission has been making cuts.

The hatchery division, for example, is going from 159 vehicles to 115, Barner said. Law enforcement, which had the second most, is going from 118 to 104.

The goal is to be down to 325 vehicles by June 30.

Choice

Commissioner Ed Mascharka of Erie County asked if the agency is doing more than just counting vehicles. Some are more fuel efficient than others, he said.

Is the commission considering such things when deciding what to keep, he asked?

The answer is yes, said executive director John Arway. And that’s leading to a change in some of the new vehicles the commission is getting.

The commission is required to buy its vehicles under standard state Department of General Services contracts, said Corey Britcher, chief of the commission’s law enforcement bureau.

In recent years, waterways conservation officers and other law enforcements staff have been getting sport utility vehicles, or SUVs. They’re expensive, though. An SUV with the same engine and equipment package is typically $10,000 more up front than a similarly-equipped pickup truck, he noted.

They’re less usable, too, he added.

When law enforcement is done with a pickup truck, Britcher said, it can usually pass it down to the bureau f hatcheries or some other department within the commission to extend its life.

“The SUVs, not so much. They’re not repurposed,” Britcher said.

So, to save money up front and in the long run, the commission will be switching back to pickup trucks for its field staff, he said. They’re not getting the trucks all at once; but as vehicles are naturally replaced, they’ll be replaced with trucks, Britcher said.

Bob Frye is the everybodyadventures.com editor. Reach him at 412-838-5148 or bfrye@535mediallc.com. See other stories, blogs, videos and more at everybodyadventures.com.

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