2025 Year in Review

2025 marked a monumental 50 years of Dial-A-Bus ensuring that our neighbors could access the services our community has to offer. Although we started as a group of volunteers helping friends get to the Senior Center, we now ensure that transportation is never a barrier to health, community, education, or happiness for over 1,000 clients. On our 50th anniversary, Dial-A-Bus faced everything from snowstorms and moving to a new office to federal budget cuts for nonprofits and transportation services nationwide. However, our team of 50+ employees and 14 volunteers rose to the challenge.

2025 Accomplishments:

• Increased transportation availability to and from the outlying areas of Benton County, ensuring more residents have access to essential services.

• Proudly provided transportation for the Oregon Special Olympics.

• Held a wedding in our office, officiated by our Executive Director, symbolizing the deep connections we make as a team.

• Joined CWCU on their podcast with our Executive Director, a volunteer, and two of our clients to share our mission and impact with a wider audience.

• We moved office spaces (one door down), which gave us more space to store all of our necessary safety equipment and allowed us to work more efficiently.

• We provided community shuttles to football games, Stone Soup for holiday meals, and the Oregon Symphony in Salem.

• Our crew volunteered for multiple highway clean-ups in Benton County, showing their commitment to making our community even more beautiful.

• We assembled and delivered Thanksgiving meals to many of our clients.

• Hosted a CASA Giving tree and our staff filled the office with gifts.

• Drove approximately 63,850 miles to get people where they needed to go. You could drive from Seattle to Miami 19 times and still not travel that many miles! (Our volunteer drivers drove around 26,000 of those miles.)

Throughout 2025, we welcomed sixteen new people into the Dial-A-Bus family: 

• New board members include Katharine Hunter-Zaworski, Kristen Jocums, and Nathan Haines.

  • Katharine Hunter-Zaworski has been conducting research and consulting in accessible transportation since 1980. She has worked on occupant protection, wheelchair securement and passenger restraint on bus and rail vehicles, and on national and international standards for accessible transportation.

  • Kristen worked as a lawyer and is currently a professional mediator. As such, she has experience working through complex issues and some of the topics that impact Dial-A-Bus. Kristen also happens to be a client of Dial-A-Bus, so she can help us further by providing another client perspective.

  • Nate has worked with Dial-A-Bus as the manager and co-owner of Fitness over 50 to ensure his clients can access the health and wellness benefits that Fitness over 50 provides. Both organizations share a common mission to provide service and enhance the quality of life for our older adult community members.

• New drivers include Monica Alvarez Rivera, Janet Austin, Kyle Bucky, Josh Combs, Wendy Geist, Dan Grigsby, Shawn Middleton Bryson, Christina Rodriquez, Shannon Shandel, and Kristine Stone.

• And we gained the help of three new volunteers!

These incredible individuals fit in so well with our team and share our commitment to leading our lives with compassion and service. Some of our drivers, whose names you may recognize more readily, have some updates as well! Kirk joined our dispatch crew, but still drives as needed. David went to the UK for a powerlifting competition where he dressed in Dial-A-Bus gear. Karen Crockett was named Employee of the Year as a long-time driver who consistently embodies the Dial-A-Bus motto of compassion, connection, and community. And last, but not least, Larry Sleeman was named Volunteer of the Year! We are so grateful to have such a large, dedicated team of people who care.

We also lost two cherished members of our family who passed away in 2025; long-time volunteer drivers Peter Kelly and Nancy Muir. Both Peter and Nancy lived long lives marked by generosity and compassion, and both volunteered as long as their health permitted. Peter’s commitment to our clients was so strong that, after he was no longer able to drive, he convinced his wife to maintain his volunteer schedule while he rode along and connected with his beloved clients. Nancy believed that volunteer driving for over a decade was insufficient, so she donated several times per year to help ensure that her riders had safe and reliable service. We will sorely miss Peter and Nancy, but we take comfort in the fact that we can best honor them by striving to emulate their legacy of selflessness.

Our donors have really allowed us to continue growing as a nonprofit. With their help this year, we were able to eliminate the service reductions caused by funding shortfalls in recent years and accommodate the growing demand for safe, reliable, accessible transportation in rural areas. We were also able to purchase new tools for changing tires and minor vehicle repairs. Jason Tighe, our Safety Manager, used to work as a Diesel Technician and he has already saved Dial-A-Bus money by replacing headlights, rearview mirrors, and other non-engine parts in-house. For these reasons, we thank every person who donated to support our services this year and we want to publicly recognize a few of our largest donors.

Board Members: Lynda Wolfenbarger, Kelly Brown, and John Gardner 

Donors: Lee Schroeder, Pete Blanchfield, Nancy Muir, and the Rose family

Sponsors: Evergreen Dental, Healing Motion Physical Therapy, Corvallis Caring Place, Fitness over 50, and more!

Esmeralda, one of over 1,000 clients of Dial-A-Bus, shared how Dial-A-Bus allows her to continue her work as an artist and activist and "maintain her free-spirit and independence." Her story is a testament to the impact of our services:

The final updates that we will leave you with from 2025 were new or improved ways to give. You may have heard of ShopRaise, where you can earn funds for Dial-A-Bus with your online shopping. Now, ShopRaise is giving funds to Dial-A-Bus for every person who signs up to use the service (even if they never buy anything online) and it is still completely free to use!

We also learned about FreeWill, which is an online service which helps you create your Will for free. Your legacy can touch many lives when you include Dial-A-Bus in your Will and break down transportation barriers for future generations.

From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for supporting our mission and keeping our wheels turning throughout 2025. We’ve been around for 50 years and we plan to be here for many more. Your kindness and generosity have touched countless lives, and together, we will continue to break down barriers. We look forward to serving all of our clients and our community in 2026!