PERFECTING THE FLEET Wayne Westerholm tracked Harding's buses, vans and vehicles after tracking bombs for the US military. D irector ofParking and TransportationWayne Westerholm, a certified automotive fleet manager in the National Associationof Fleet Administrators, era used his previous experience and military background to oversee the distribution of vehicles for university-sponsered trips. While Westerholm was deployed overseas, he worked in operations centers to track convoy securitymissions for almost 300 trucks. "We were tracking where the bombs were going off and attacks and other things," Westerholm said."It's a military thing. We track everything ... so at least we can start showing where things are." After returning from his deployment in 2009, Westerholm worked to expand the Harding vehicle fleet, perfected the problematic organization system and created maintenance records for university audits. The logistics for university-sponseredtrips were unorganized and vehicle breakdowns left the drivers, studentsand administration with a convoluced issue. Westerholmaddressed the problem soonafter taking his position. "For the first year or two, I was having a [vehicle] breakdown [every] month to where we had a [full] vehicle of students breaking down in random locations,"Westerholm said."One of the first things I learned was that we had no records of what was going on with the vehicles --- no maintenance records, nothing." Chuck Hicks, associate professor of music and director of Belles & Beaux and Good NewsSingers, drove the vehicles multiple times across the U.S. with Belles & Beaux, a 13-member band sponsored by the department of music. H icks recalled a specificmoment when one of the Harding buses broke down while he was driving Belles & Beaux through Las Vegas, Nevada. "I could hear that a bearing was going out on the bus," Hicks said. "When we pulled over to the dealership, the bearing wa just out, and we had to figure out what we were going to do [with] all 15 of us in Las Vegas." Hicks had to fix the bearing himself, but the Belles & Beaux bus breakdown was not unique. After several breakdowns like that one, Westerholm tracked all the records of the bus maintenance reports and presented the spreadsheet to the university administration. He was able to convince the university they needed to expand their fleet from three old buses and four unreliablevans to four new buses, eight reliable vans and two carsby 2018. Junior Hannah Reed worked for Westerholm for two years, "I think [the vehicles] are nice," Reed said. There's Wi-Fi in the buses.I think the passengers are pretty happy." Reed considers Westerholm to be more ofa leader than a boss. Working for him has been really great," Reed said."He is really respectful to me, soI just want to return that to him." story by Wesley Bryant & Kendra Christopher Director ofParking and Transportation Wayne Westerholm examines the lock on the back door ofa Harding bus on Nov. 13, 2018. Westerholm monitored Harding vehicle breakdowns all across the country. I photo by Sterling McMichael Wayne Westerholm, director ofparking and transportation, monitors university-sponsoredtrips on Nov.13, 2018, in the Office ofTransportation. Westerholm was a certified automotive fleet manager in the National Association of Fleet Administrators. I photo by Sterling McMichael 211 I FACULTY & STAFF FEATURE
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