In The News
Trucking stakeholders urge FMCSA to hold off on Safety Fitness rule until CSA is reworked
Many trucking industry stakeholders weighed in during the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's Safety Fitness Determination proposed rule comment period, urging the agency to hold off on the rulemaking until the Congressionally mandated reforms are made to the Compliance, Safety, Accountability Safety Measurement System.
The December-passed FAST Act highway bill requires the agency to the rework CSA system following the myriad of reports pointing out the system's major flaws.
Even though the initial comment period on the agency's proposed SFD rule ended May 23, those still wishing to comment can respond to comments already made in the docket until June 23. The full list of comments made can be found here.
The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking outlined FMCSA's plan to update its safety rating system for carriers by integrating on-road safety data from inspections, along with the results of carrier investigations and crash reports. All of this would determine a motor carrier's overall safety fitness on a monthly updated basis.
The SFD rule would replace the current three-tier federal rating system of "Satisfactory, Conditional and Unsatisfactory" for carriers with a single determination of "Unfit," which would require the carrier to either improve its operations or shut down.
The American Trucking Associations said it is "strongly opposed" to the SFD proposal because it uses the same data as the current Compliance, Safety, Accountability Safety Measurement System.
"FMCSA should withdraw its proposal until the Congressionally mandated National Academies of Sciences review of the SMS is complete and the agency has implemented corresponding corrective actions," ATA said in its comment.
ATA did say, however, that if the FMCSA could make the needed improvements to make the SMS system reliable, then it could support a future proposal similar to this one.