House Speaker Boehner of West Chester and Eric Cantor, Majority Leader from Virginia have asked President Obama to withdraw the administrations proposed changes to the hours-of-service rules for commercial drivers. Both said in a letter to Obama on Oct 5, that withdrawing the proposed changes is an "opportunity to avoid adding another $1billion in regulatory burden" to the economy and to small businesses. It is estimated 90% of all trucking companies can be classified as small businesses.
Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) has filed an amendment (S.AMDT.754) to the "minibus" Appropriations Bill (H.R. 2122) which is made up of the Commerce, Justice and science; Agriculture, Rural Development, and Food and Drug Administration; and Transportation and Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Bills. The amendment would block implementing the pending hours of service rules for truck drivers. Ayotte’s amendment at this point has only been filed and may never be considered.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration rule, which is supposed to be made final on Oct. 28, but which seems likely to slip past that deadline, would reduce the daily driving limit for truck drivers from 11 to 10 and change drivers availability to restart their weekly work-cycle with a 34 hour rest period. The FMCSA has said they will not reduce driving time to 10 hours but it is clearly leaning in that direction.
Driven by the Teamsters, it appears that these proposed changes have other reasons behind them than just safety, and a further reduction in an already shrinking driver pool will only lead to upward pressure on transportation costs. These costs are almost always passed onto the consuming and buying public. Just to serve the current volume (which is low) more trucks will need to be added to our over-crowded highway system putting more stress on our infrastructure. This ill-conceived change will only further harm a struggling industry and add hundreds of millions of dollars in costs just through regulation. Whatever happened to an administration that was going to ease regulation on small businesses to foster job growth?
