ST. LOUIS — Grappling with a shortage of drivers and mechanics, Metro Transit plans to begin offering incentive pay in order to attract more drivers and retain more employees.

The board governing the region’s mass transit agency approved the change in policy at a special meeting Friday.

“Given where we are in the employment crisis, this is absolutely critical,” Taulby Roach, CEO of Metro Transit parent Bi-State Development, told his board Friday.

Metro Transit is currently short about 120 to 130 operators for MetroBus and MetroLink, Roach said. The change to Bi-State’s rules allows management to act quickly to offer incentive pay in order to increase staffing levels.

“It simply stops us from having to call a special meeting at every single incentive,” Roach said.

Management will still inform the board of any incentive pay changes, he said.

Roach said the changes should help the system attract new drivers and retain existing ones, who are working extra shifts and overtime to make up for the shortage.

“Those are the folks who are still really moving St. Louis and need to be recognized,” he said.

The policy change comes as employers struggle to fill jobs amid a quickly growing economy that this spring had begun emerging from the worst of the pandemic. In the St. Louis region, the labor force — the number of people working or seeking work — has rebounded from its pandemic lows last year but in June was still down almost 30,000 from June 2019, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The area’s labor force was about 1.47 million in June, a level for this time of year last recorded in 2014.

In order to maintain service at scheduled times as it rebuilds staffing levels, Metro officials said last week said they would reduce the frequency of some bus routes on the Missouri side of the system’s service area. The reductions, to begin Sept. 6, won’t eliminate any routes but will reduce bus frequency on some routes to every 20 minutes from about 15 minutes now. Another round of frequency cuts is planned at the end of November.

It takes at least two months of training to prepare a newly hired driver, Metro officials say.

The reductions follow complaints about missed stops that have surprised some MetroBus riders. Officials say MetroBus is still executing about 98% of its scheduled trips. The system has also begun piloting a new program with ride-sharing company Lyft to give last-minute rides to customers impacted by unexpected stop cancellations.

Metro Transit also was hit by driver shortages in 2019, though those difficulties came amid negotiations on a new union contract. Most frontline Metro Transit workers belong to the Local 788 of the Amalgamated Transit Union and are covered by a union contract. Metro last approved a three-year contract at the beginning of 2020 that called for 2.25% wage increase in the first year, followed by 3% pay hikes the following two years.