Page 11 - ATR 4 2013

NEWS iN briEF

doES 30-yEar old rUlE oN go up exponentially.” bers of the Commercial Vehicle Safety
iNSUraNcE Work? Proponents of the legislation say it Alliance (CVSA). Of their inspections,
The required insurance minimum protects the American public as well as a total of 47,771 were North American
for motor carriers has been the same trucking companies by ensuring suf- Standard Level I inspections — the
since 1980. According to Representative ficient coverage is available to cover most comprehensive roadside inspec-
Matt Cartwright (D-Penn.) the current the total costs of commercial vehicle tion — in which vehicles and drivers are
requirement of $750,000 is not enough accidents. assessed for violations of federal, state
to protect crash victims and fails to per- or Canadian provincial safety regula-
form the basic functions that Congress NEEdS iMprovEMENT: rESUlTS tions. Out of those Level 1 inspec-
intended: to promote safe operations iN FroM NaTioNal roadcHEck tions, 24 percent had OOS violations.
by holding insurers responsible for EvENT Officers also conducted driver-only and
inspecting trucking operations prior to The results are in from the vehicle-only inspections that aren’t as
underwriting policies and to protect the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance’s intensive as the Level 1 inspections.
public. Roadcheck 2013 event that was held A total of 71,630 driver inspections
Cartwright wants to raise the mini- the first weekend in June. One in five were conducted with 4 percent of them
mum amount of coverage that a motor vehicles inspected were placed out-of- found to have OOS violations. That’s
carrier must have to $4.4 million per service during the 72-hour safety event. up from 22 percent of vehicles and 3.9
truck. The number might seem excessive The enforcement and safety outreach percent of drivers placed OOS in 2012.
to some, but he cites the rising cost of campaign was carried out by mem- 
health care as the reason for the needed
increase.
A study by the Trucking Alliance
found that only one percent of settle-
ments paid by trucking companies
between 2005 and 2011 for motor vehi-
cle accidents exceeded the minimum
insurance requirement. The Trucking
Alliance supports raising the minimum,
but did not specifically endorse the
amount proposed by Cartwright.
Prasad Sharma, general counsel at
the American Trucking Associations,
says that data suggests the current
amount is adequate. The Owner-
Operator Independent Drivers
Association is taking a similar position.
“The legislation will not make highways
safer and is completely unnecessary,”
says OOIDA spokeswoman Norita
Taylor, “If enacted it would have a
devastating impact on small-business
truckers as their insurance costs would

arkansas Trucking reporT | issue 4 2013 11