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New Procedures for Drug and Alcohol Testing Possible

The Department of Transportation (DOT) is proposing to amend certain provisions of its drug and alcohol testing procedures to change instructions to laboratories, medical review officers (MROs) and employers with respect to adulterated, substituted, diluted and invalid specimen results. These proposed changes are intended to create consistency with specimen validity requirements established by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. This NPRM also proposes to make specimen validity testing (SVT) mandatory with the regulated transportation industries as well as a number of recommended changes for the laboratory and MRO responsibilities with regard to SVT.

Some of the most notable recommendations in the NPRM are as follows:

• Making SVT Mandatory
• Utilization of Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) SVT instructions to laboratories for establishing and directing actions for SVT, including appropriate cutoffs.
• Adoption of HHS procedures for both laboratories and MROs regarding the numerous actions for split specimens.
• Continue requiring that some negative dilute specimens be recollected under direct observation.
• Having MROs obtain a negative result if one is needed for pre-employment, return-to-duty and follow-up testing if the employees presents two invalid results for the same reason or when the employee has a long-term medical condition that causes an invalid result.
• Clarifying MRO duties with reviewing and reporting multiple test results for the same specimen and multiple specimens collected during the same testing event.

To review the entire NRPM, visit www.dot.gov/ost/dapc/frpubs.html . For more information contact Dave Heller at 703-838-8847 or dheller@truckload.org.

How to Comment

Comments for the NPRM may be submitted within the next 60 days by any of the following methods:

• Web Site: http://dms.dot.gov
• Fax: 1-202-493-2251
• Mail: Docket Management Facility, US DOT

400 Seventh Street,SW, Nassif Building, Rm PL-401
Washington, D.C. 20590-0001

• Hand Delivery: 9am – 5pm (M-F)

RM PL-401
On the plaza level of the Nassif Building
400 Seventh Street, SW., Washington , D.C.

• Fed. eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov

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CVSA Votes Down Performance Based Brake Testing (PBBT)

The general membership of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) recently voted down the use of Performance Based Brake Testing (PBBT) for use in placing commercial motor vehicles out-of-service.

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PARADE Magazine Article on Trucking Appears

As you may have seen on Sunday October 30 PARADE published its long-anticipated article on the trucking industry. 

Getting out in front of the story, as the industry did and doing it quickly made a difference.  For the most part, the story provided a balanced report on the industry and featured a large graphic provided by ATA's Share the Road program on a truck's blind spots.

This was the third story published by PARADE in the last nine years, and the first to focus more in-depth on the positive safety record and efforts of the trucking industry.

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6 Steps to getting Started on the Right Foot
Driver Retention Techniques

How many times have you said, “if the driver would have just given it another week it would have worked out?” Many times drivers quit before we think they really give us a chance. But we have to ask ourselves, “did we really do our best to make them feel like they made the right choice coming to our company?” In this article I will outline six steps to make the most of the time we have with the driver in orientation.

1. Recruiters should meet their drivers in orientation – People get committed to people not to companies . The driver chose to come to work for your company not only because of the pay and benefits you offer, but because they believed the recruiter as they presented the information. There is a relationship of trust that is developed. However, many recruiters don't think they have time to go into orientation and meet the drivers they hired because they are so busy hiring next week's class.

This can be the start of the driver's impression that he/she is just a number. Furthermore, it is a lost opportunity for the recruiter to ask the driver for his/her help by referring other drivers to them.

2. Be Organized – One of the things I do as an independent consultant conducting driver recruiting, retention analysis and training is to attend orientations undercover as a driver. This gives me the opportunity to experience a company's orientation program from the eyes of a driver. Moreover, I hear first hand what drivers think about the orientation process.

One of the biggest gripes I hear from drivers is when they have to sit around and wait for the presenter during orientation. All they can think of is the fact that they aren't making enough money to pay their bills while sitting in that class.

3. Give the tour early in orientation – Most companies schedule the tour of the company as the graduation march from orientation.

Give the tour of your company no later than directly after lunch on the first day. During this tour you can introduce as many of the key personnel as are available. This will work to make the drivers feel like they are already part of the company.

4. Introduce the Fleet Manager/Dispatcher early in orientation – This is usually part of the graduation march I mentioned above. The Fleet Manager is sitting at their desk and they look up just long enough to ask the driver what truck they will be on and say a half hearted “glad to have you” and then they tell the driver to make sure to sign on to the satellite system so they can send them a load.

The introduction to the Fleet Manager should take place during the tour on the first day. This will start the relationship and provide the opportunity for the driver and Fleet Manager to continue a relationship over the course of orientation during breaks and lunch. It also allows time for a meeting in which they go over mutual expectations which sets the tone for the entire working relationship.

5. Assign trucks on first day of orientation – This is usually done at the very end of orientation; and with great expectations the driver goes out to the truck ready to throw his/her stuff in it and finally get on the road. But while inspecting it they find a couple things the shop needs to fix before they leave. Now they are sitting and waiting again. Then they start asking themselves “is this the way it's going to be?” Then they think about going to talk to their recruiter about it, or the orientation instructor or their Fleet Manager. But they can't because everyone has gone home. Often this is how they will spend the first night at their new company.

If you assign the drivers to their trucks on the first day of orientation it helps them to start feeling like they belong. They can move into the truck during the evening and if they find any mechanical issues it gives the shop another day or so to fix the truck without having the driver waiting and looking over their shoulder.

6. Consider not withholding company equipment and new employee deductions from the first check – Many companies hold back the first paycheck so drivers can very likely work for 2 - 3 weeks before they get their first check. And then, much to the driver's dismay it isn't a full check because they were sitting in orientation for part of the first week. To add additional financial pressure to an already stressed situation, the company has withheld for safety equipment and escrow accounts. So after working 2 weeks they owe you $52.14.

Many drivers have missed at least one paycheck when they come to orientation and like most other Americans; they are living paycheck to paycheck. With this in mind companies should consider how to get the driver making as much money as possible as quickly as possible. One way to do this would be to not withhold any company charges out of the first several checks. This would help get the driver caught up financially and keep them long enough to realize they made the right choice coming to your company.

Successful Driver Retention is about doing a lot of the right things right. Most driver retention solutions don't cost anything, but simply improve the way we do the things we already do.

By Kelly Anderson, President of Impact Transportation Solutions, Inc., 888-429-3445 or kelly@impacttrans.com.

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Transport Canada: New HOS regulations formally approved for 2007

According to Transport Canada , changes to the Commercial Vehicle Drivers Hours of Service Regulations that will reduce the maximum daily driving time for commercial drivers and increase their minimum off-duty time have now been formally approved. The regulations will be published in the Canada Gazette Part II on Nov. 16, according to Transport Minister Jean-C. Lapierre.

"The Government of Canada is committed to continually enhancing the safety of commercial drivers and all other users of Canadian road and highway systems," Lapierre said. "These new regulations will significantly enhance the current regime for truck and bus drivers in Canada , resulting in improved workplace safety and quality of life."

The new rules will reduce the maximum driving time for commercial drivers by

19 per cent, from 16 to 13 hours, in a 24-hour period. They will also increase minimum off-duty time by 25 per cent, from eight to 10 hours. The new rules will also reduce daily on-duty time by 12 per cent, from 16 to 14 hours.

Transport Canada said these new regulations incorporate current scientific research on driver fatigue and reflect an agreement reached between Teamsters Canada and the Canadian Trucking Alliance in 2001.

They are the result of public consultations and extensive cooperation between governments and stakeholders, in concert with the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators. The regulations will continue to be enforced by the provinces and territories. The new regulations will be effective as of January 1, 2007.

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Sacramento Bee Highlights Inaccuracies of Truck Safety Coalition

The article below appeared in the October 24 issue of the Sacramento (CA) Bee and examines inaccuracies in data provided by the Truck Safety Coalition. Anti-truck groups have done a good job of spreading their message, but here is an excellent example of a columnist who has studied the issue and reached a different, more accurate conclusion.

Dan Walters: Pathos, skewed numbers often add up to political propaganda

By Dan Walters -- Bee Columnist
Published 2:15 am PDT Monday, October 24, 2005
Story appeared on Page A3 of The Bee

The opening paragraph of a story that appeared last week in the Los Angeles Daily News, written out of its Washington bureau, had an ominous tone: "Deadly big-rig crashes are piling up on California freeways, putting the Golden State second only to Texas in the sheer number of annual truck fatalities, a study released Monday found."

The "study," as it turned out, was issued by the Washington-based Truck Safety Coalition, whose chief cause is to oppose the Bush administration's efforts to change the allowable working hours of truck drivers.

The Truck Safety Coalition's data, drawn from federal records, indicated that there had been an increase in fatal accidents involving big trucks in California , from 370 in 2003 to 415 in 2004. It contends that driver fatigue is the leading cause.

Joan Claybrook, who heads the coalition, was quoted as saying, "Too many trucks on the highways are sweatshops on wheels," and urging Congress to reject the new rules, which went into effect on Oct. 1.

California 's highways are heavily congested, and having legions of sleepy drivers behind the wheels of immense 18-wheelers in such crowded conditions would be a serious safety hazard, if true.

However, data maintained by federal and state safety offices don't support the contentions. While the raw numbers of fatal crashes involving trucks have increased, the number of trucks and the miles they travel in California have increased so sharply that their fatal accident rate has actually been declining steadily, a fact noted only briefly near the bottom of the Daily News article.

If one delves deeply into the accident records maintained by the California Highway Patrol, the assertions become even less supportable. Of the 339 fatal crashes involving big rigs in 2003 (a somewhat smaller number than the federal traffic safety office counts), the CHP lists just 86 as being caused by truck driver error. Of those, speeding was the leading cause at 24, followed by turning errors at 18.

Sleepy drivers were involved in exactly zero of the trucker-caused fatal crashes in 2003 and in just 10 of the 3,634 non-fatal injury accidents in which truck drivers were at fault.

Zombie-like truck drivers endangering the California public is, in short, nothing more than fictional propaganda dreamed up by some political advocates to persuade gullible reporters into publicizing their issue. And it's a prime illustration of why we should look askance at political claims, no matter what their source or how splashy their packaging.

The Truck Safety Coalition staged a news conference with the families of those killed in crashes involving big trucks to juice up media coverage of the fight over trucker rules. "The news conference is part of a four-day Sorrow to Strength conference for families and friends who have lost loved ones or been injured in truck crashes," the coalition said in a notice. "Sorrow to Strength will give them an opportunity to share personal stories and meet others injured in a truck crash or who have suffered the loss of a family member or friend, learn how to deal with grief and anger and to help others (or) become a truck safety activist and lobby members of Congress to improve road safety."

Contrived pathos has become a staple of political lobbying. That's why, for example, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, the very powerful union that represents prison employees, subsidizes so-called "victims' rights" groups whose members show up at legislative hearings to plead emotionally for legislation that would put more people behind bars - and therefore create the need for more prisons and prison jobs. They would have us believe that crime is engulfing the state and that we're in imminent danger of being murdered in our beds, when the data on crime tell us otherwise.

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OSHA Extends Comment Period on Revised Rule for Electric Power Transmission and Distribution Installations

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is extending the written comment period by 90 days on updating the standard for the construction of electric power transmission and distribution installations to make it consistent with the revised general industry standard. The extension was published in the October 27 Federal Register.

The notice extends the period for written comments on the proposed rule to Jan. 11, 2006. OSHA extended the comment period to grant interested parties more time for a thorough review and response to the proposal. Additionally, the informal hearing originally scheduled for Dec. 6, 2005, will now be held on March 6, 2006; the extension reopens the period for interested parties to file notices of intent to appear at that hearing.

The proposed standard includes requirements relating to enclosed spaces, working near energized parts, grounding for employee protection, work on underground and overhead installations, work in substations, and other special conditions and equipment unique to the transmission and distribution of electrical energy.

People wishing to comment should submit written comments, postmarked no later than Jan. 11, 2006, to: OSHA Docket Office, Docket No. S-215, U.S. Department of Labor, 200 Constitution Ave., N.W., Room N-2625, Washington, D.C. 20210. Comments may also be faxed to (202) 693-1648, or submitted online via the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov, or OSHA's Web site at http://dockets.osha.gov. All comments and submissions will be available for inspection and copying at the OSHA Docket Office at the above address, and posted on OSHA's Web site.

For more information contact Dave Heller at 703-838-1950 or dheller@truckload.org.

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House Leaders Say Oil Refining Must Expand

The Washington Post reported that House Republican leaders on October 25 called on oil companies to spend more to expand the nation's refining capacity.

Five Republican leaders, appearing at a news conference, said increasing the capacity of refineries would help lower high consumer prices. "We expect oil companies to do their part to ease the pain," House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) said at the news conference. In prepared remarks, Hastert said that "increasing capacity and improving refineries will help boost supplies so that consumers do not feel such a big pinch."

The comments came after hurricanes that significantly disrupted refining operations in the Gulf Coast region, tightened supplies and sent gasoline prices above $3 a gallon.

Lawmakers have been under pressure from constituents to address high energy prices.

Recently several oil companies announced quarterly profits that analysts expect have swelled as a result of high prices and tight supplies of crude oil and gasoline.

Refining capacity has not expanded as quickly as demand in recent years. But oil industry officials said they are spending significant amounts of money to increase refinery capacity and that Congress should ease environmental restrictions and make it easier to obtain permits.

"We support the call for more refinery capacity," said Red Cavaney, president of the American Petroleum Institute, a Washington-based industry group. "We're going to keep increasing capacity on the refineries."

Democrats and environmentalists said Republican leaders were trying to make it appear as if their party was doing something about high consumer prices when it has been more focused on providing tax breaks for big oil companies.

The news conference -- which also included Reps. Deborah Pryce (R-Ohio), David Dreier (R-Calif.), Eric I. Cantor (R-Va.) and Joe Barton (R-Tex.) -- featured criticism of Democrats for not supporting Republican energy measures. Hastert faulted Democrats for not backing legislation seeking oil and natural gas production in Alaska 's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other locations, saying more needed to be done to reduce dependence on foreign oil.

Democrats said that they had repeatedly sought measures to increase automobile mileage requirements and take other steps to reduce consumption that were defeated because of Republican opposition.