Last week, the King County Council voted to transfer three dozen Metro Vanpool vans to local governments and community programs, providing transportation assistance for the dozens of agencies that were notified they would receive a vehicle.

The retired vans have been in service for at least six years and are considered surplus. The council has transferred over 600 vans to local organizations since the program’s inception in 1996. Among the recipients this year was the Vashon Park District.

At the board’s meeting on April 23, Executive Director Elaine Ott-Rocheford said that if the district were chosen, the van it receives would be used to provide recreation opportunities for underserved demographics on the island, namely teenagers and the senior and special needs populations.

In a follow-up conversation, recreation manager Eric Wyatt said the van will allow for the district to ferry teens off of the island to attend movies, music, theater and museum events offered by Seattle nonprofit TeenTix, which works to empower teens through access to art. The van will also allow for outbound trips for skaters who frequent the Burton Adventure Recreation Center to visit other skateparks, as well as provide transportation for seniors to swim at the community pool.

He added that a meeting with the Vashon Senior Center was forthcoming to discuss supplementing its van program.

“I’m just really excited it’s going to expand our programming options to give people more things to do that they can’t currently do,” he said.

At the meeting, Ott- Rocheford added that there was not a lot of time to submit an application once the county began to solicit them.

“[Then] they called and said, you know, your odds are really good that you guys are going to get this,” she said.

Last Thursday, the district learned it would receive a van minutes before The Beachcomber requested comment.

There are a number of requirements the district had to meet in order to qualify for the program. It had to have the capacity to manage the vehicle’s needs and operation, to provide for drivers and to have specific plans for using it. No information about the vehicle’s size was available before press time.

Final board approval is required before the transfer can be completed.