The Student Association Mass Transit Board voted Monday to allocate $8,700 to purchase and operate a used, handicapped-accessible van which NIU’s Transportation Supervisor has twice advised against purchasing.

“I pray to God it runs,” said board member Carl Witt.

The 1980 mini-conversion van will be purchased from TRANSVAC, a service of DeKalb’s Voluntary Action Center, to provide day and night handicapped student transportation to classes and other destinations. The van has traveled about 92,000 miles and has room for about two wheelchairs plus four-to-six other passengers.

The board voted to spend up to $4,000 to purchase and repair the van and $4,700 to provide operational costs such as drivers’ salaries. The funds will be provided through student fees.

Board Chairman Dave Emerick has said the van would provide “a major part, if not all” of handicapped student transportation at NIU. But graduate assistant Robin Purdy-Lee said Monday “there is no sure cure that (the van’s wheelchair and scooter) lift will be able to handle all wheelchairs of any size.”

Transportation Supervisor Bill Finucane, who last year advised the board against buying the van, echoed that advice Monday in a memo to the board that stated, “There is no guarantee that we would not be ‘nickeled and dimed’ by repair problems.”

Finucane said at the meeting, “There are a lot of potential problems with anything this old. When it breaks down there will be no backup for it.”

He added that the transportation department will attempt to have the van repaired and ready for service by the beginning of the 1989 spring semester.

In the meantime, board Chairman Dave Emerick said handicapped students will “have to bear with the transit board because I don’t foresee having daytime (handicapped) transportation (for the remainder this semester).

Board member Kristen Hallerud said the purchase “is a short-term solution. It’s a quick way out of our problems. After we buy the van we go on to the next problem of trying to keep it running.”

But SA Sen. Russ Stewart said, “Sure, this is a crummy van. But it doesn’t have to last forever, as long as it gets the job done. Overall, the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.”