newsworthy
the conference report. The Senate did not include any
hiring-standard provisions in its version.
The House bill directs FMCSA to commission a three-year study by the Transportation Research Board (TRB)
of the FMCSA’s controversial Compliance, Safety, and
Accountability (CSA) program, which grades carriers based
on a series of metrics and then assigns them performance
scores under what is known as the Safety Measurement
System, or SMS. The bill requires FMCSA to remove all
SMS data from public viewing until the TRB publishes its
report and recommendations from a corrective action plan
have been implemented.
The language in the House bill somewhat resembles
wording in the Senate’s version, with the key difference
being that the Senate bill allows raw data to remain in public view while removing the scores and carrier analysis.
MIXED REACTIONS
House lawmakers rejected proposals to reduce motor-fuels
taxes, dealing a setback to those who believe that transport
funding should devolve to the states through their own
taxes and user fees, and that the federal government’s
involvement should be dramatically scaled back or eliminated. Excise taxes on gasoline and diesel-fuel consumption
are the principal sources of road and transit funding for
federal projects.
The bill raises $9 billion in revenue by selling oil from
the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, an emergency
stockpile to be drawn down in the event of a national
emergency that curtails or halts the flow of oil. As of early
August, the reserve held 695.1 million barrels of oil, just
short of its 713.5 million-barrel capacity, according to
data from the Department of Energy’s Energy Information
Administration.
The bill granted the nation’s railroads a three-year
extension from the current Dec. 31, 2015, deadline to
install positive train control (PTC), a series of advanced
technologies designed to automatically stop or slow a train
before accidents occur, eliminating the human-error cause
of railroad accidents. The railroad industry has argued that
the complex systems will cost billions of dollars to develop
and install, and cannot be fully implemented by year’s end
without shutting down large portions of their networks,
thus potentially crippling the flow of U.S. commerce. The
industry had recommended the three-year extension.
The House, like the Senate, voted to allow trucking
companies to use hair follicles rather than urinalysis for
employee substance abuse testing. Hair testing detects an
individual’s drug use for a period going back months before
the test, while urine testing, currently the only pre-employ-ment driver screening required by law, only detects drug
use for a few days back and can be easily subverted by an
applicant. Supporters of the measure said that would help
keep potentially unsafe drivers off the road. However, the
test may have an unintended consequence, namely that it
will disqualify applicants who might have passed with a
urine test alone, thus further shrinking the available pool
of drivers.
Reaction to the House vote was predictably mixed.
For example, the American Trucking Associations, which
represents large for-hire trucking firms, was mostly satisfied with the legislation. However, highway safety groups
decried it as a huge step backward in protecting the traveling public. The only positive action, in their view, was that
the House killed an amendment that would have raised
the weight limit for trucks operating on national highway
system roads to 91,000 pounds of gross vehicle weight—
tractor, trailer, and cargo—from the current 80,000-pound
ceiling.
—Mark B. Solomon
Tom O’Brien, vice president of sales for conveyor rollers
and components specialist Ralphs-Pugh Co., will retire
on Dec. 15, 2015. … Seko Logistics has
appointed Randy Sinker to the newly created post of chief client solutions officer.
… The distribution consulting company
Fortna has hired Gary C. McKinney as
vice president of human resources and
George Van Der Merwe as director of
sales, EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and
Africa). … Intelligrated has appointed Dave Schmit
senior vice president, corporate intellectual property.
… Neil Hampshire has joined ModusLink Corp., a global
omnichannel technology and fulfillment provider, as its
new chief information officer. … KOM International,
a supply chain consulting firm, has named two new
senior partners: Vincent Canonico and Peter Reed. …
Southeastern Freight Lines, a provider of regional less-
than-truckload transportation services, has promoted
Josh Beaty to service center manager in Bowling Green,
Ky., and Brian Garner to service center manager in
Nashville, Tenn. … Jasin Effland has joined the supply
chain firm Boston Industrial Consulting Inc. as a senior
consultant/project manager. … Third-party logistics ser-
vice provider Allen Lund Co. has named Toni Rooney
manager at its Minneapolis office.
newsmakers
SINKER
