US supreme court ruling on CSA 2010 points

Well a warning could mean anything subjective to the LEO at the time... Say you have a trailer tire that has some, most, or almost all of the tread deep enough... but some of the tread is not. While one can argue that the tire is fine by test, only this spot isn't.. It's not a dangerous violation, but requires attention soon. Hence the warning. With this said, the warning will give points to CSA that cannot be contested under due process of the law. Here in, is the problem.

With this said, even judges cannot believe this, I know of an instance is Illinois that a warning was contested in court. Judge was wonder why they were even in court, it was explained to the judge that the 'warning' was damaging as it went on the drivers CSA via his company. Judge ruled in favor of the driver, and made a formal request for it to be removed from the CSA (still safe stat at the time) CSA was just starting at the time. Several months went by, and they didn't remove the data from CSA, that was requested by the judge's ruling. The driver went back to court(same judge) to show him this... Let's just say the judge was VERY unimpressed... PISSED is probably a better word. He called a federal judge he knew personally, and it was finally removed from CSA.

My point? Even judges cannot believe the overstep of the law in a persons rights of due process in CSA warnings. Problem is many of them likely don't know about it until they have a case in this area.

 

Also I was personally fined by the Co I am leased to for a warning. I am sure I am not the only one . NothingI could do about. If I tried to go to court I'd lose more money by not working, how do you contest a warning anyways?

 

You can contest it, but it is a total joke. It requires you to file a complaint about the warning, and the issuing officer and his supervisor review it. (LOL! Just how do you think that will go?) So, the issuing officer of the warning would basically have to admit he was wrong or in error for issuing the warning. Crock of crap huh?

What the guy did in the post above was he got a lawyer and went to court over it. He was semi retired and cared more about the principle than the money(I assume he wasn't hurting for money at all as he also owned a farm he worked). And I'm sure it cost him a bit to do, but the judge did rule in his favor and requested that CSA drop the data off his CSA company score with extreme prejudice. When CSA didn't comply for months, the judge was pissed.

 

We had this same situation at a former employer of mine. The safety director took action against driver's for reporting the receipt of a citation. Of course then when the ticket was fought in court, and dismissed, he refused to refund the fine. After a driver took the company to court and won with additional compensatory damages, they decided they better change and not do anything until the citation was paid or lost in court.
Nothing worse than being found guilty before the trial.

 

Oh then it must be true. Wonder if the story was written by a French Model?

 

I agree that a warning should not be counted and add points to your CSA score, But if a patern is proven with a driver recieving warnings of the same nature, then I can understand points being added

 

Let a DOT Bear with over 20 years experience jump in here, if I may.

We have been conducting roadside inspections forever, writing down EVERY violation of the regulations. Every loose lug, light out, brake out of adjustment, bad tire, cracked rim, cracked frame, etc. Individual warnings (violations) were no big deal. Mostly they are ALL listed to communicate to the carrier things that need to be fixed. Some carriers and owner operators will not fix things until they are made to, you all know that.

So, we go along for decades listing EVERY violation, every defect, and only issuing citations (tickets with fines) for the most egregious and hazardous violations. An inspection may have 5, 10 or 15 violations, and only one or two citations.

Now, CSA 2010 comes along. Somebody takes the violations we list on inspections and plays a numbers game with them, keeping track of points for a score. The theory being that if a carrier has a pattern, or a track record of violations, repeated violations, they will be able to focus attention on those carriers. Any point, by itself, is not supposed to be the end of the world. Only when they are repeated and accumulated.

I totally get and understand your point. I am an old driver myself. Warnings, which used to be a small thing between us DOT inspectors and drivers or carriers, have become something much more critical. Especially with other segments of our industry focusing on your CSA scores.

But, let me ask you... If I perform an inspection on your vehicle, which violations (defects) am I supposed to list on the report, and which ones am I supposed to ignore and not write down? If I do not list EVERY defect, then I am not doing a thorough job as an inspector and am not doing my job well. Should I say that cracked rim is not cracked? Should I say that out of adjustment brake is not out of adjustment? That turn signal that is not working, am I not supposed to list that?

CSA 2010 has changed our relationship, drivers and inspectors, and not for the better. CSA points have driven a wedge between you and I, and neither of us likes it.

 

I'm wondering if it might be designed to get after companies who were racking up minor violations, and not bothering to fix the "small" stuff, then that companies attitude gets into a more dangerous one where eventually major violations on a vehicle rarely get fixed at all until either a dot inspector shuts that vehicle down or a really nasty wreck happens because of equipment failure.

 

I think the point is that the better companies and their drivers would always fix stuff. Even drivers stuck working for the bottom feeders or dirt bad companies used to have an option. See and open scale, pull in, walk in, and talk to the a DOT officer about a small problem the boss didn't want to fix. Almost always, the DOT would be happy to help, give the boss a call say you're at a scale house and you need the issue fixed.... If the boss still, was dragging his feet... ask if he would like to talk to the DOT officer, as he is right beside you. Problem solved, period!

Now, with CSA no driver in their right mind would ever try something like this...