A new bill has been introduced in the House that would see a 15 cent per gallon increase in fuel taxes as a solution to the highway funding deficit. The bill, being called the UPDATE Act, has been presented by Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon.
Rep. Blumenauer has said that the fuel tax increase could serve as a short-term stop-gap to keep the Highway Trust Fund alive. According to him, the “short-term” increase would be only temporary until a more stable source of funding can be found by 2024. [click to continue…]
Another chapter in the Pilot Flying J legal battle has come to a close with the approval of an $85 Million settlement to be split among the 5,500 companies who took part in the class-action suit against the largest truck stop chain in the United States. The lawsuit is over charges that Pilot Flying J deliberately withheld portions of fuel rebates that they owed to trucking companies as part of a fuel rebate scheme. [click to continue…]
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced on December 2nd that it would be fixing one of the most common complaints about their CSA scoring system. They will be allowing the Motor Carrier Management Information System to be updated to reflect the current status of a previous citation. This will be good news for drivers and carriers who are issued a citation and then are able to get it repealed. [click to continue…]
The California Air Resources Board is best known in the trucking industry for setting emissions standards for commercial motor vehicles operating in the state of California. The next deadline for CARB-compliant upgrades is in 2014, and to help truckers meet their requirements, CARB is giving away $80 million to small fleets and owner operators so that they can upgrade their vehicles. [click to continue…]
Two drivers have won a lawsuit against their previous employer, awarding them $300,000 and a return to their old jobs. Both drivers had been fired after refusing to drive unsafe vehicles that were not displaying the proper information.
The lawsuit was filed against Star Air, Inc and its owner Robert R. Custer by the U.S. Department of Labor, which said that the terminations violated whistleblower protections afforded by the 1982 Surface Transportation Assistance Act. [click to continue…]
Two recent reports have given new evidence that the July 1st Hours Of Service (HOS) changes have had a largely negative impact on the trucking industry. The first, released by OOIDA, claims that the HOS changes have decreased driver pay and negatively impacted driver fatigue. The second report, conducted by the ATRI, claims that more than half of all truck drivers on the road have seen a pay cut as a result of the rule changes.
The OOIDA survey was conducted by sending out an email to its members containing a brief note and a survey that asked questions regarding the HOS changes. They received over 4,000 completed surveys, the majority of which showed that the changes were negatively impacting drivers. Of those surveyed, 65% claimed that they had lost income, and 46% stated that they actually felt more fatigued as a result of the changes – the opposite of the result that the FMCSA has been aiming for. [click to continue…]