NJ Transit board votes Thursday on a $115.8M paratransit extension that doesn’t start until 2028, plus six payouts with no public price

JERSEY INTEL EXCLUSIVE

NJ Transit’s board is scheduled Thursday to approve another $115.8 million for the company that runs Access Link paratransit rides in Essex, Union, Somerset, Morris and parts of Hudson counties, for service that doesn’t begin until July 2028. The same agenda asks the board to approve six other payments whose dollar amounts appear nowhere in the public documents, including four injury settlements that each top $1 million.

A 2028 extension, voted on in 2026

Access Link is NJ Transit’s door-to-door paratransit service, which the Americans with Disabilities Act requires for riders who can’t use fixed-route buses and trains. The resolution says Easton Coach won Contract 21-063 through a competitive request for proposals that offered the “best value,” and that bidders had to price two option periods up front, “to be exercised at NJ TRANSIT’s sole discretion.”

The board first approved the contract in November 2022 (Board Item 2211-84) for a base period of April 10, 2023 through June 30, 2026. The resolution on Thursday’s agenda describes that base as 39 months; the October 2025 resolution called it 38 months.

According to the October 2025 agenda, the base was capped at $110,958,918 plus 5%, or $116,506,864. At its Oct. 9, 2025 meeting the board was asked to add $19,123,573 plus 5% ($20,079,752) to the base, citing “unforeseen ridership increases, and enhanced service standards and performance requirements per DOJ Settlement DJ#204-48-305,” and to exercise option one: 24 months, July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2028, capped at $100,939,921 plus 5%, or $105,986,917. Thursday’s resolution says the board approved option one in October 2025 (Board Item 2510-45).

That vote came about nine months before option one began. Thursday’s vote on option two would come about 20 and a half months before it begins.

What the numbers show

• Base (2023–2026): $116,506,864, plus the $20,079,752 increase, with contingencies.
• Option one (24 months, 2026–2028): $105,986,917 with contingencies, or about $4.21 million a month before contingencies.
• Option two (22 months, 2028–2030): $115,838,830 with contingencies, or about $5.01 million a month before contingencies, about 19% more per month than option one.
• Total authorization if Thursday’s item passes: $358,412,363.

The monthly figures are Jersey Intel’s calculations, dividing each option’s cap before contingencies by the number of months the board lists. The July 1, 2028 to April 9, 2030 window is slightly shorter than 22 full months, so the true monthly figure would be a bit higher. The resolution says option two is subject to “the availability of funds and approval of NJ TRANSIT’s Operating Budget.”

Because bidders priced the options in the original procurement, the option-two price was presumably set when the contract was awarded. The documents don’t say whether it was. They also don’t say whether the ridership growth and DOJ-settlement requirements that pushed the base over its cap are built into the option prices.

Nothing in the documents indicates wrongdoing by Easton Coach or NJ Transit.

Six payments, no public price

Every other action item on the agenda leaves its dollar amount to executive session, the closed-door portion of the meeting:

• Four personal-injury settlements (items 2610-53 to 2610-56): claims by Thomas Bianco, the Estate of Jordan Miller, Boguslaw Plonski and Patrick Griso. Each resolution says the claim has “a probable settlement cost greater than $1,000,000,” the threshold at which NJ Transit’s bylaws require a board vote, so together they top $4 million. The resolutions say the Attorney General approved the Bianco and Plonski settlements and NJ Transit’s Office of General Counsel approved the Miller and Griso settlements.
• Tarheel Enterprises and WSP (item 2610-52): a settlement of the lawsuit over the 69th Street Grade Separation and Road Improvements bridge, a contract NJ Transit signed with Tarheel on Jan. 15, 2010. According to the resolution, NJ Transit terminated Tarheel for cause in 2018, the surety finished the bridge with a different contractor in 2019, and Tarheel sued in May 2019 (Essex County, L-3279-19), with WSP USA, the designer formerly known as Parsons Brinckerhoff, brought in as a third-party defendant. After six years of discovery and mediation, NJ Transit would pay “an amount discussed in executive session, plus expenses, court costs if any.”
• Clifton land (item 2610-51): a 0.73-acre piece of 203 Kuller Road, owned by Keystone NJP, LLC c/o Prologis, needed for a new Northern Maintenance-of-Way facility that NJ Transit is developing on land it owns at 99 Kuller Road. The resolution says staff reached a negotiated deal, with terms “discussed in Executive Session,” and it also authorizes eminent domain if the purchase isn’t completed.

Questions the documents raise

• Why exercise a July 2028 option now, about 20 months early, when option one was approved about nine months ahead?
• Was the $110.3 million option-two price fixed in Easton Coach’s original proposal, or has it been renegotiated?
• Does the option-two price account for the ridership growth and DOJ-settlement requirements that pushed the base contract $19.1 million over its original cap?
• How much will NJ Transit pay in each of the four injury settlements, in the Tarheel and WSP settlement, and for the Clifton land, and will those figures be released after the vote?

Watching or going Thursday? The board meets at 6 p.m. at Two Gateway, 283-299 Market Street, Newark, and streams at njtransit.com/board. The agenda says the deadline to pre-register for public comment is 5 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 14. Record the discussion if you can, and send video, notes or documents to jerseyintel@gmail.com or Tip Us. Jersey Intel will report what the board adopts once the minutes or resolutions are posted.