By
Team Writer
/ July 18, 2017
The House Transportation, Housing and Urban Development (THUD) has came out with a draft to a bill that will prevent individual states from dictating when truckers take their meal and rest breaks. It will also prevent the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration from doing a safety fitness test until the DOT Inspector General has issued certain certifications. This bill also calls for increasing the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration annual budget by over $100 million.
Key Takeaways:
- For several years now, trucking lobbyists have been seeking a legislative provision that would prevent individual states from enacting their own meal and rest break rules for CDL drivers, as well as to prohibit states from requiring that those drivers be paid certain types of added compensation, such as detention pay.
- Earlier this year, the Federal Motor Carrier Administration announced it was scrapping its proposed rule on a revised methodology for issuing safety-fitness determinations for motor carriers.
- The draft House bill also calls for increasing the annual budget of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration by over $100 million– and pumping up the DOT discretionary budget by $1.5 billion more than the amount sought by President Trump.
“The upshot is, with or without the no-SFD rider, it will be up to eight months from now before trucking can hope to see the reforms to the CSA program recommended by NAS come into play.”