Senate hearing has all-star lineup, covers issues top to bottom

Sen. Frank Lautenberg isn't too happy about the state of safety in the trucking industry and wants some changes to occur quickly.

By BARB KAMPBELL
The Trucker Staff

4/28/2010

WASHINGTON — Put together a line-up of trucking industry agency leaders facing the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and it’s likely there will be at least a few exchanges where voices might not be raised, but the tone of voice insinuates frustration or even accusation. And such was the case today when some on the panel disagreed with others as well as Senate members who weren’t too happy with the state of trucking safety.

While almost all things trucking were discussed during today’s Oversight of Motor Carrier Transportation Efforts, the most talked about regulatory issues were Hours of Service, electronic on-board recorders, and CSA 2010.

Chairman of the subcommittee on surface transportation Sen. Frank Lautenberg said the latest HOS rules that have been introduced and implemented in the past “were so egregious that the courts struck them down not once, but twice. The Obama Administration has made the right move by initiating a new rulemaking on driver hours. But let’s be clear,” he added, “when this process is over, we cannot wind up with the same flawed regulations that the last Administration designed.”

Lautenberg said a “key way” to enforce HOS and combat driver fatigue and hold drivers accountable is with EOBRs, and he said the last EOBR rule would only affect 1.3 percent of all trucking companies and that is “far short of universal installation, which the National Transportation Safety Board has placed on its most-wanted list.”

He not only wants every truck installed with EOBRs, he wants all vehicles to have them.

“EOBRs should be installed on every truck and bus to protect all drivers on the roads, whether they are driving a truck, a bus, or a family car.”

After Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administrator Anne Ferro testified, Lautenberg wanted more specific information on what the agency is going to do about EOBRs. He said EOBRs only capture a small portion of the industry.

“Why hasn’t your agency issued a more comprehensive EOBR rule?” he asked Ferro.

“We were constrained in how broad we could make the rule,” Ferro responded. “We are pressing ahead with a broader rule. It was clear to me that to implement a broader rule we would not be able to get it in place as quick as this one.”

Todd Spencer, vice president at the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, pointed out that there’s no data on EOBRs and how they may or may not improve safety.

Spencer also said OOIDA does not oppose the latest EOBR mandate which mandates EOBRs for only the worst offenders.

“The point I want to make on EOBRs is that there’s no safety data to show they enhance highway safety,” Spencer said. “They can’t tell if a driver is sleepy, they can’t tell if a driver needs to rest, they can’t tell whether a driver is off duty or whether he’s physically handling 44,000 pounds of cargo. They are no more reliable than the paper logs that they would replace.”

Spencer also said they would have a large financial impact because of cost on the small companies.

Jacqueline S. Gillan, vice president of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety said the drop in fatalities is attributed to the economy and less vehicles on the roads, not an increase in safety efforts by the industry, and, she said, once the economy picks up, so will the injuries and fatalities caused by large trucks.

“The fatality rate is declining,” Gillan said, “but it doesn’t have anything to do with the HOS rule. To make that connection that for some reason allowing truck drivers now to drive 77 hours in a week has some way contributed to this drop, you know, Advocates and other safety groups would say absolutely not. Courts overturned that rule in a scathing opinion. They questioned and criticized the agency. …We have an FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] that is working to reduce the number of hours of a pilot in the cockpit because of fatigue, in the trucking industry and over at FMCSA we issued a rule that allows a truck driver to drive 77 hours in a week which is almost a 30 percent increase in the old HOS rules. Increasing the number of hours a truck driver can drive is not the answer to addressing fatigue.

Also testifying were: Deborah Hersman, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board; David Osiecki, senior vice-president, policy and regulatory affairs, American Trucking Associations; and Francis France, president of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance.

In all, the hearing lasted two hours. For more information, see the May 15 print version of The Trucker.

Barb Kampbell of The Trucker staff can be reached for comment at barbkampbell@thetrucker.com.