Trucking Industry

2020 International Roadchecks Have Been Set for May Fifth Through the Seventh

February 18, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) an organization that includes both local and national government officials in North America, as well as industry representatives, will be conducting its International Roadcheck this year on May 5-7. The Roadcheck is an initiative meant to focus attention on the importance of commercial vehicle safety through a 72 hour marathon of roadside vehicle inspections throughout North America.

Inspectors will be checking both vehicles and drivers. They will conduct driver interviews, review documents, and check their records and inspection reports. Inspectors will also be looking for signs that a driver may be ill or fatigued, and whether the driver displays any signs of drug or alcohol abuse.

The inspectors will also conduct vehicle inspections to make sure drivers are operating a properly maintained rig. CVSA inspectors will be placing decals on vehicles on which no critical violations are found during their Level I or Level V inspections. However, inspections that do reveal critical violations may be rendered out of service until any violations are corrected.

Some drivers or motor carriers may decide they want to sit out the inspections all together. If you stay off the road in early May there is less of a chance of having to go through an inspection. However, not driving to avoid getting checked is not only unsafe it is also a bad business move.

If you’re not driving, you’re not earning. The purpose of running any efficient transportation business is to make a profit. With plenty of time and a warning of upcoming inspection dates, drivers and motor carriers can prepare to make sure all their logs, records, licenses, certifications, and vehicles are in proper order. A vehicle that doesn’t pass and is put out of commission cannot produce an income. A vehicle that has violations but is hidden from inspectors creates a great safety risk to professional drivers and to the public who use the roads. When a crash happens, you can be certain that there will be law enforcement, government officials, and lawyers scrutinizing over records and conducting inspections to find violations. In these situations, the risk of being put completely out of business is a real consequence that motor carriers can face. Even if the majority of a given company’s fleet is violation free, the part that is not can result in a shutdown.

Chances are that everything we see around us from goods, food, to furniture got to where it is at least in part by a truck. Commercial motor carriers are operating in a business that holds definite risks to public safety and property damage when people do not follow safety rules. If motor carriers or drivers do not follow safety rules and a crash occurs, government inspectors can cause the whole operation to be shut down. Crashes can also lead to insurance rates skyrocketing, making it too expensive to keep the business running.

Public safety is not the only concern when it comes to operating a commercial trucking company. IF a driver gets hurt as the result of an unsafe truck the company that driver works for can incur costs for worker’s compensation and will be short a driver. Additionally, vehicles are expensive. It costs money to fix or replace a damaged truck. Taken as a whole, it will certainly be less expensive to properly maintain a fleet of vehicles and follow all the proper safety rules rather than to cut corners. It’s much less expensive to stay safe than to recoup after a crash. Of course, your life and health are priceless.

California’s AB 5 Law Blocked from Affecting Truckers

February 17, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

A new California labor law is controversially combatting worker misclassification, and ensuring independent contractors are recognized as employees–but is being temporarily blocked in the trucking industry.

The law would put into place regulation allowing gig economy workers, who often work on a flexible basis, to now be given the same benefits as formal employees. It went into effect on January 1st and is currently seeing heavy pushback from the tech and trucking industries–in which many of these freelancers work–as well as from lawmakers promising to work to change the legislation.

The federal court issued a temporary injunction earlier this month that would prohibit the rules to apply to truck drivers–creating a major issue with federal law.

When Assembly Bill 5 was implemented, it also created a test for whether or not an individual working for a company is an employee or an independent contractor. Consequently, the law means ride-share drivers are treated as if they are exploited by their businesses.

If classified as an employee, the worker must become eligible for full California employment protection, and cannot opt out of the classification regardless of whether or not he or she would prefer to continue working independently.

On the other hand, AB 5 would allow more than a million independent contractors to have rights to health care, a minimum wage, and the ability to join a union. The focus is to disallow companies to circumvent basic labor protections for anyone working for them.

However, with a bar on enforcement for the trucking industry, the question of whether or not states can regulate interstate motor carriers is revisited. Trucking companies are saying the new three-part test is stricter than previous standards, and would block the common use of independent contractors to haul freight–a widely-used practice in the industry to find independent owner-operators to carry out interstate jobs.

“With AB 5, California runs off the road and into the preemption ditch of the FAAAA,” wrote Judge Roger T. Benitez of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California in a Thursday ruling on a lawsuit filed by the California Trucking Association, along with truckers Ravinder Singh and Thomas Odom.

The judge blocked the state from enforcing the law on California motor carriers in a preliminary injunction “pending the entry of final judgment in this action.”

Judge Benitez wrote that there is “little question that the State of California has encroached on Congress’ territory by eliminating motor carriers’ choice to use independent contractor drivers, a choice at the very heart of interstate trucking.”

The court concluded that to allow enforcement on owner-operator truckers would bring about irreparable harm to the industry. According to the judge, unless companies change “their business operations to treat independent-contractor drivers as employees for all specified purposes under California laws and regulations,” they will risk potential criminal and civil penalties.

Although the injunction is only at a preliminary stage, it is not likely the state will prevail if the case does ever end up in trial. Additionally, the judge’s finding that the plaintiffs would most likely see victory will put enormous pressure on California to find a different angle on this issue.

The order could also affect similar potential proposals in other states, and deter the groups currently working to see these regulations take place elsewhere.

Shawn Yadon, California Trucking Association chief executive officer, said this ruling is “a significant win for California’s more than 70,000 independent owner-operators.”

Many companies with ride-share and delivery drivers, such as Uber and Postmates, say AB 5’s exemptions deem the law “irrational” and a violation of equal protection.

Although the bill’s main sponsor says its goal is to protect the “more than a million Californians” who “have been misclassified by employers looking to cut costs at the expense of workers,” how can anyone know which workers are truly misclassified when we don’t know exactly what they want? Many workers will continue to prefer an independent contractor’s flexibility.

Although the statute is legal, that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a good idea. As of now, it may be the case that some gig workers do experience exploitation for the companies they work for–but is the solution to take the freedom to choose away from everyone else?

FMCSA Prioritizes Reducing Fatal Crashes in 2020; Asks for Public Comment

February 16, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

2020 is the year the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is calling for a major turn around regarding trucking fatalities that have occurred over the last four years.

Administrator Jim Mullen is urging the agency to find ways to solve this issue as soon as possible. On January 14th, the FMCSA issued a public comment request on the best way to go about studying key factors in large-truck crashes.

The Large Truck Crash Causal Factors Study will replace the agency’s current 15-year-old crash causation study, which it has been using to make policy decisions.

“When I assumed this role as acting administrator three months ago,” said Mullen at the Transportation Research Board’s January meeting, “the members of this panel asked me what are my top priorities. That to me was a no-brainer. The top priority for me at this agency is to reverse that four-year trend increasing fatalities involved with large trucks and buses.”

The agency’s information request will look toward bringing about new ways to take into account data sources, samples, ranges of crash types, and cost efficiency. It also notes that the new study needs to address onboard electronic systems and how they gather data about lane departure, speeding, and braking.

The study will also work to bring through new information that will help the industry discover which activities will bring large reductions in crash rates involving commercial motor vehicles.

“In the more than 15 years since the original study, many changes in technology, vehicle safety, driver behavior and roadway design have occurred that affect how a driver performs,” said the pre-publication announcement. “Since the study ended in 2003, fatal crashes involving large trucks decreased until 2009, when they hit their lowest point in recent years (2,893 fatal crashes). Since 2009, fatal crashes involving large trucks have steadily increased to 4,415 fatal crashes in 2018, a 52.6% increase when compared to 2009. Over the last three years (2016-2018), fatal crashes involving large trucks increased 5.7%.”

FMCSA will be accepting public comments on the request for 60 days after the January 15th publication.

In a “commercial motor vehicle safety landscape” briefing at the meeting, FMCSA’s chief safety officer, Jack Van Steenburg explained that the biggest driver-related factors in fatal truck crashes were distraction, speeding, and failure to yield right-of way.

“The first goal is to stop that upward trend,” Van Steenburg said. “For the next several months, we at FMCSA are going to go out and talk with people. We’re going to listen to people. We want to tell them what we’re doing, ask how we can do it better, what we can do differently, and how we can do it differently to prevent these crashes from occurring.”

Van Steenburg also assured that agency leaders would be in talks with state officials, especially those in states that have seen a decline in these crashes.

“We always show you the top 10 states that have had crashes,” he explained. “But in Pennsylvania, we saw a 22% decrease in fatalities; Georgia, 16%; California, an 8% reduction.”

Another method of bettering the study will be integrating crash datasets with additional information sources in order to begin “completing the picture of crashes,” according to Bill Bannister, the chief of FMCSA’s Analysis Division.

“This will allow us to drill down into the types of circumstances surrounding crashes, the differences among the types of crashes, and whether it’s the vehicles involved or the roadway that’s involved. This sort of information might provide predictors of crashes.”

National Transportation Safety Board project manager Ryan Smith, also outlined the challenges in finding useful data regarding marijuana-using drivers. According to Smith, researchers warn against understanding drug impairment by using the federal Fatality Analysis Reporting System. He says that although those using marijuana could fail a drug test, there is data showing they may not actually be impaired to drive safely.

There is a lot of data out there that is not properly being discussed,” said Smith. “The concern is that people are using data improperly and coming up with these conclusions that are not in journals but are in news reports. Some of the findings are being twisted and can actually be doing more harm.”

Additionally, Joe DeLorenzo, administrator for FMCSA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance, said the agency is currently working on updating its Compliance, Safety, Accountability Program’s safety measurement system. It will use a complex method called “Item Response Theory” to further analyze data. However, he says the system is still not understood by many in the industry.

An evaluation of the IRT model is not expected until later this year.

Fatigued and Distracted Truckers Continue to Cause Fatal Accidents

February 1, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

ROCKFORD, Ill. — On January 11th, a FedEx truck in northern Illinois struck a disabled vehicle and killed the woman inside.

According to Illinois State Police, the truck driver crashed into the disabled vehicle around 1:20 a.m. on I-90 in Rockford, and the woman driving the disabled car was pronounced dead at the scene.

The woman had her 4-year-old child in the car–the child had non-life threatening injuries and was taken immediately to a nearby hospital for treatment.

Unfortunately, incidents of this kind aren’t rare. In March of last year, a state trooper and a passenger in a disabled car were hurt when a tractor trailer collided with both the patrol car and the disabled vehicle on the side of the road in Kingston, New York.

New York State Police said the trooper was was helping the driver to change a tire and that the trooper had been sitting in his vehicle when the tractor trailer hit his cruiser and then the driver’s side of the disabled vehicle before continuing to drive northbound on I-87.

The tractor trailer managed to push the SUV into the passenger of the disabled Tahoe, which caused the driver to be pushed into the guard rail. Both the driver and trooper were transported to the nearest hospital for non-life threatening injuries.

All U.S. states have a “Move Over” Law in place which requires all vehicles to safely move over into further-away lanes for all police, firefighters, first responders, tow-truck drivers, and other personnel as the work at accident scenes.

Because all commercial truck drivers are trained with these laws in mind and are taught how to drive without distraction, it seems avoidable accidents such as these should occur much less regularly. However, there are a multitude of reasons why they don’t.

The biggest one? Fatigue.

When the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced its plans to relax safety rules for truck drivers–including implementing extended duty time and more flexible mandatory break time–many people were worried about what the longer hours could mean for distracted driving and driver fatigue among truckers.

Linda Wilburn, for instance, was waiting for her 19-year-old son Orbie to stop by her house just 10 miles from his new rental when he was fatally hit from behind by a big rig speeding down I-40 east from Weatherford, Oklahoma.

The 41-year-old Kentucky truck driver also died at the scene. According to Linda Wilburn, he had been driving at least 1,300 miles “without a rest break at all” from Bakersfield, California.

Because of this, the Wilburn family has been rallying against the new proposed flexibility, which would allow drivers to split up mandatory 10-hour rest breaks into 5-5 or 6-4 hour splits, with control over whether or not they actually rest. It would also extend driving time by two hours for truckers working in any inclement weather conditions and would lengthen the maximum on-duty period to 14 hours.

Still, the National Transportation Safety Board says it is working hard to focus on fatigued driving issues, and has named the reduction of fatigue-related accidents on its ‘Most Wanted List’ of 2019-2020 safety improvements.

“Drowsy driving does not leave telltale signs,” the list says. “It is widely believed to be underreported on police crash forms.”

Harry Adler, the Truck Safety Coalition’s executive director, knows this is a major road safety problem.

“These (proposals) are opportunities for drivers to be pushed to their limits further, to drive without resting,” he explained, “It’s more opportunity for a driver to operate while fatigued, which is really detrimental.”

Because fatigue while driving can lead to slower responses and distracted actions, some in-cab driver monitoring systems are working to deter it. Bison Transport has been testing in-cab monitors through Seeing Machines Limited technology, meaning it will install its automated monitoring systems into one of Canada’s largest fleets.

During a testing period, the company found a reduction of 67% in fatigued driving incidents, of 40% in distracted driving incidents, and of 97% in cell phone use. The driver monitor can assess a driver’s visual attention, drowsiness, and probability for risk with its vision algorithms by tracking eye movement and notifying drivers with audio and vibration alerts.

Although methods like these may be helpful, it appears the biggest boost we could give truck driver safety would be to ensure truckers are regularly getting enough rest and are able to stay alert throughout their entire journeys. When that is the priority, it is safe to assume all drivers on any road will be much safer.

U-Haul Refuses to Hire Nicotine Users

January 30, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

Starting February 1st, U-Haul will no longer bring any nicotine users onboard.

In a recent announcement, the moving and truck rental company said it will now refuse to hire nicotine users in the 21 states which legally allow that decision–citing the desire for a “healthier workforce” as the reason.

This nicotine-free policy is possible in states without protections for the rights of smokers. However, it won’t apply to employees hired prior to February.

In a news release, company chief of staff Jessica Lopez said U-Haul will be working toward fostering an overall new “culture of wellness.”

The states in which the new policy will take affect include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington.

Prospective applicants in these states, which allow companies to choose not to hire job seekers using nicotine, should expect to find information on the anti-nicotine policy on their applications and to be questioned about their use of nicotine, U-Haul said. In states where testing is allowed, applicants may also have to undergo nicotine screening to be hirable.

U-Haul said it is striving to encourage wellness among its employees, and is working on a new fitness center in one of its Arizona locations, as well as multiple wellness and fitness programs.

The company currently employs over 30,000 people throughout North America and will work toward helping its current nicotine-using workers with cessation assistance.

“In our continued efforts to enhance our wellness program and decrease health care costs, we have become more aware of the medical side effects of using nicotine and tobacco products,” said Lopez.

These products include vaping tools and e-cigarettes, in addition to traditional cigarettes, according to the policy. U-Haul company officials have also explained their inspiration from hospitals and other health-conscious businesses which are implementing nicotine-free hiring methods.

Alaska Airlines has had a no-nicotine policy in place since 1985 in order to help keep health care costs and health consequences lower.

U-Haul’s decision to follow suit comes soon after President Trump signed legislation raising the minimum age of those purchasing any tobacco or vaping products from 18 to 21.

However, while public health experts may be pushing for smoke-free lifestyles, they are torn on whether or not companies and employees will benefit from the new policy.

Michael Siegel, professor of community health services at the Boston University School of Public Health, said that U-Haul’s policy is misguided in terms of its approach to furthering wellness, as those who are addicted to nicotine may have trouble quitting and opt for nicotine-infused gum, patches, or lozenges. Nicotine replacement treatment is able to appear in nicotine-screening urine tests.

“Essentially, what that means is if you quit smoking and start using nicotine patches or nicotine gum or electronic cigarettes, you are not eligible to work for that company if you’re using nicotine replacement products,” he explained.

According to a survey by the Food and Drug Administration, around 7 percent of smokers can successfully quit smoking for at least six months to a year; however, the Mayo Clinic found that over 30 percent of smokers can quit fully with the help of a nicotine-replacement product.

“There are a lot of vices out there, and [these workers] have just chosen this one thing,” said Siegel. “[Banning it] is just kind of inappropriate.”

Lynn Kozlowski, University of Buffalo School of Public Health and Health Professions professor, wants U-Haul to note that some nicotine-infused products are more harmful than others–like cigarettes and cigars as opposed to smokeless tobacco.

Products like smokeless tobacco and nicotine products for vaping are less likely to contaminate public workplaces or affect work performance. Banning all nicotine products together causes U-Haul to look as if its policy is based on morals rather than health, Kozlowski argued.

“I bet if U-Haul were to look at [its] corporate office, [it has] a coffeepot going most of the time and people addicted to caffeine,” he said.

This begs the question, where does a trucking company–or any employer–draw the line between raising reasonable health standards and being intrusive?

According to Kevin Schroth, associate professor at the Rutgers School of Public Health, the company’s new rule could be deemed unfair to those who have fallen victim to the tobacco industry’s strong advertising techniques–which are aimed heavily at young people.

As of now, said Kozlowski, U-Haul’s policy announcement does not have nearly enough clarity for full scrutiny.

Industry Drug Test Rates to Rise by 50 Percent in 2020

January 27, 2020 by Levinson and Stefani Leave a Comment

The day after Christmas, federal regulators made a huge announcement for the trucking industry: they plan to increase the minimum yearly random drug testing rate to 50% of a carrier’s drivers–up from the previous rate of 25%.

The short-notice mandated increase was made public by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on December 26th, and was implemented only a few days later on January 1st, 2020.

The FMCSA currently estimates around 3.2 million commercial license holders are working in interstate commerce and another 1 million in intrastate commerce. With a new rate of random drug testing, about 2.1 million random tests will take place throughout 2020.

The FMCSA estimates the additional tests will cost the industry an additional $50 million to $70 million per year.

There is already a fair amount of pushback regarding the data which led to the increase.

“This data was collected in early 2019, and to my knowledge there has been no indication from FMCSA about the increase in positive tests that led to the minimum random testing rate change,” said president of Scopelitis Transportation Consulting, Dave Osiecki. “Not only is it a financial hit that no one was expecting, it’s disappointing to know that more drivers are testing positive for using drugs.”

The agency’s 2001 rule, “Controlled Substances and Alcohol Use and Testing,” determined the process used by the FMCSA to decide whether or not the minimum annual percentage rate for any random testing could be increased or decreased. In the final rule, the decision to change the percentage rate was to be mandated by the trucking industry’s overall positive random controlled substance test rate, the data of which is presented to the agency by motor carrier employers themselves.

According to Osiecki, there will be a decrease in industry productivity due to the higher number of drivers being summoned to testing sites when they could be on the road.

J.J. Keller’s Tom Bray said all carriers, large and small, will feel the effects of an increase in testing costs.

“It’s the same thing you’re doing, you just have to do more of it,” he said. “The key thing there is that it went back up to 50%, which is where it was for many, many, many years previous to the calendar year 2016 change.”

Bray believes meeting the 50% rate will bring major difficulties for many carriers, as many fleets experience high turnover rates and random testing can bring even more issues in those cases.

A 2018 survey of nearly 5,000 randomly selected motor carriers estimated that the test rate of random controlled substances was around 1%, making it slightly higher than that of years past.

“When the minimum annual percentage rate for random controlled substances is 25%, and the data received under the reporting requirements for any calendar year indicate that the reported positive rate is equal to or greater than 1%, the FMCSA administrator will increase the minimum annual percentage rate for random controlled substances to 50% for all driver positions,” said the agency.

The reason Bray believes test rates are increasing is that the Department of Transportation has added four synthetic opioids to drug screening–including hydrocodone, hydromorphone, oxymorphone, and oxycodone.

“This is a major issue in the country in general,” Bray said. “Our group of drivers represents the country. If the country’s having trouble with opioids, so are drivers.”

Manager of safety and occupational health policy for American Trucking Associations, Abigail Potter, said although the increase is expected, most companies have already completed their annual budget planning for 2020, and the short notice by the FMCSA will cost the industry millions of dollars.

Additionally, Potter believes federal acceptance of a different method of drug screening would have been a solution.

“We need hair testing,” she said. “One of the disappointments here is that we could’ve prevented this situation.”

The proposed guidelines given by the Department of Health and Human Services, which would allow carriers to utilize hair testing for drug screening, have had little attention by the Office of Management and Budget since summer of 2019.

In regards to random alcohol testing, as of now, the FMCSA has confirmed the minimum annual rate will stay at 10% in 2020.