ATA Asks Supreme Court to Review Rulings on Portions of L.A. Port’s Clean Truck Plan

Attorneys for American Trucking Associations have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a federal appeals court decision that rejected the Port of Los Angeles’ employee-driver plan but left standing several other “burdensome” requirements for carriers.

In its Dec. 22 petition, ATA said appeals courts have been divided on several legal issues and that important questions surrounding ATA’s 2008 lawsuit remain to be answered.

Allowing the differences to persist will lead to a “ ‘patchwork’ of laws, rules and regulations,” ATA’s legal brief said.

ATA’s attorneys told the high court that the federal preemption clause gives the government the authority to regulate interstate trucking, rather than local or state governmental bodies.

The employee-only provision of the clean trucks plan of the Port of Los Angeles — part of the nation’s largest port complex, along with the Port of Long Beach — has been in litigation since 2008, when ATA first challenged it in a federal district court in Los Angeles.

The case has advanced twice to federal appeals courts, with the latest decision rendered in September, when the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the port’s argument that it has the authority to ban owner-operators from servicing the port.

The decision rejected the port’s argument that the “market participant doctrine” allowed it to regulate and enforce environmental requirements on carriers. The court did rule, however, that the port has the right to require drayage operators to submit an off-street parking plan, properly maintain their trucks, post placards on permitted trucks and demonstrate financial capability.

Although ATA hailed the circuit court’s decision as a major victory for carriers, ATA Chief Counsel Robert Digges Jr. said allowing the port to impose the four requirements would be a “financial burden” for many drayage operators.

In its petition, ATA said the Supreme Court should consider three legal issues.

The first concerns the preemptive scope of the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act of 1994, which does not allow states or localities to issue regulations that would interfere with the “routes, rates or services” of motor carriers.

The second issue, ATA said, involves the scope and applicability of the “market participant exception” used by the port to justify its employee-only provision.

The third is the “enduring vitality” of the Supreme Court’s precedent-setting 1954 decision in Castle v. Hayes Freight Lines. That decision said a state may not suspend a carrier’s right to use the state’s highways in its interstate operations as punishment for repeated violations of a state law.

The port will have until the end of January to respond to ATA’s petition, and then ATA will have an opportunity to respond to the port’s argument, said Curtis Whalen, executive director of ATA’s Intermodal Motor Carriers Conference.

The court is expected to decide whether to take the case in April, Whalen added.