More than 200 current employees of Long Island Bus joined a team from Veolia Transportation to learn more about career opportunities with Veolia, which will assume day-to-day responsibility for operating the Nassau County bus system on January 1, 2012. Employees of Long Island Bus also picked up more than 800 paper applications during the six, 90-minute meetings held at the Uniondale Marriott on September 14-15. All workers at Long Island Bus are currently employees of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which will continue to operate Long Island Bus under contract with the county through December 30, 2011. Because Veolia was selected by the county to join it in a public-private operating partnership to run Long Island Bus, including Able-Ride, as of January 1, 2012, any workers on the Nassau bus system will be employees of Veolia. Nassau County will retain oversight in critical areas such as setting fares and service levels, and will continue to own all bus system assets, including busses, terminals, depots, equipment, etc. The decision by the county to take control of its bus system was the right one and partnering with a leading transportation management company like Veolia helps ensure that the system is more stable and that quality transit jobs are more secure, said Nassau County Executive Edward P. Mangano. These first HR meetings are the beginning of the hiring process in which Long Island Bus employees will have preference for jobs in the Nassau bus system. Drivers, maintenance technicians, IT, administrative staff and others were all represented at the meetings, which included extensive question and answer sessions and presentations by Veolia's CEO for the Nassau County bus system Mike Setzer, General Manager Roger Chapin, and Regional Director of Human Resources Sheila Talley. Attendees were urged to submit their completed applications for positions with Veolia by September 30, 2011 in order to be included in a preferred group of job candidates; current Long Island Bus and Veolia employees are being given preference in hiring. We have been very impressed with the hundreds of Long Island Bus employees we have met, said Setzer, who previously served as chief executive of bus systems in Minneapolis-St. Paul, St. Louis and Cincinnati. The Long Island Bus folks are outstanding transit professionals and we look forward to working with them to provide excellent service to the riding public.