The Board of Selectmen’s Tuesday, Dec. 6 meeting ended on a tense note when Selectman Michael Schneider alerted his fellow selectmen that graduate students will not be performing a study of Wareham’s school bus issue this spring as previously planned.

Last month, Town Administrator Mark Andrews proposed that a group of graduate students perform a study of how much it costs the school district to run its transportation department and how much it would cost to subcontract to a private vendor.

Board of Selectmen Chair Walter Cruz met privately with Superintendent Dr. Barry Rabinovitch, School Committee Chairman Geoff Swett and Finance Committee Chair Frank Heath in a private meeting to discuss the proposal. After the meeting, Cruz said he was under the assumption that everyone was in agreement before going back to their respective boards.

“Something was lost in the cracks,” Cruz said.

The Board of Selectmen had voted unanimously in favor of Andrews’ proposal, with a condition that no buses would be leased or otherwise purchased during the time of the study. The School Committee did not agree with the caveat, expressing the immediate need for replacement buses and saying that it had previously been proven by multiple committees that it’s cheaper for the town to run its own transportation department.

During the November 16 School Committee meeting, when the proposed study was discussed, Rabinovitch said that Andrews told him that a funding source for bus leases may become available. He added that a plan is being developed so by the end of December there may be a way to fulfill the lease and three bidders had responded to the School Department’s request.

It is not clear what the bids were or where the money for the lease may come from, but should funding become available Town Meeting would still need to approve the leases. Rabinovitch also said that if the money does not materialize, the schools’ transportation department would have enough funds in its revolving account to enter into the leases from money generated from the transportation department itself.

As a result of their discussion, the School Committee did not act on Andrews’ proposal to use the students, so Capital Planning Chairman Alan Slavin did not contact the graduate students for the study. Slavin said Tuesday that he was under the impression that all parties needed to be in agreement.

Selectman Ellen Begley said she was “dismayed” that Slavin didn’t go forward with contacting the students, despite not having approval from the School Committee. According to her, Andrews’ proposal was not contingent on all parties being involved.

Begley also said she’s “alarmed” that the school district cannot pay for books, but somehow has thousands of dollars to purchase buses. (Books cannot be purchased out of the transportation revolving account that the School Department is proposing to use to fund the leases. Those funds can only be used for transportation costs.)

Selectman Cara Winslow proposed that the Selectmen reach out to the School Committee to see what happened.

“I would feel a lot better if I knew what went wrong,” she said.

Schneider disagreed with her, saying that he was “sick” of hearing that the town has to reach out to the School Committee.

“It’s about time the School Committee reaches out to the town and starts working with the town,” he said, which was met with applause from the audience.

Winslow responded that this would isolate people and result in “making enemies,” before Cruz closed the meeting.

The Selectmen voted in favor of adding the discussion of school transportation to the agenda for next week’s meeting.

The board agreed to begin next week’s  meeting at 6 p.m., due to the week’s already lengthy agenda.