ATA Councils Restructured With Focus on Advocacy

American Trucking Associations’ focus on advocacy has resulted in a number of changes among the federation’s professional councils over the past year.

Three ATA councils — Sales & Marketing, Transportation Loss Prevention & Security and Information Technology & Logistics — were either dissolved or combined with other councils.

In May, members of the Sales & Marketing Council voted to affiliate with SMC, an Atlanta-based service bureau that publishes rates and provides data-processing services for motor carriers. SMC was formerly known as Southern Motor Carriers.

The new organization is called the Transportation Sales & Marketing Association and is headed by John Rader.

SMC President Jack Middleton said the new group was formed because his organization “felt a sense of responsibility to the less-than-truckload transportation industry to allow them to have a forum for sales and marketing professionals for networking, education and sharing values.”

TSMA will hold its first annual meeting April 8-11 in Naples, Fla.

The other councils — Safety Management, National Accounting & Finance and The Maintenance Council — are all undergoing changes to conform to ATA’s core objectives. On Oct. 4 at a meeting in St. Louis, ATA’s Safety Management Council and Transportation Loss Prevention & Security Council were reconstituted as the Safety & Loss Prevention Management Council (10-9, p. 4).

The North American Transportation Management Institute will remain a part of the S&LPMC organization, according to Executive Director Jai Kundu. There has been discussion in the past about spinning off the training unit, possibly to the Truckload Carriers Association’s Truckload Academy.

The National Accounting and Finance Council will play an expanded role in fashioning ATA tax and finance policies and add information technologies to its portfolio of issues (See related story).

TMC will continue to focus on developing equipment and maintenance standards for the medium- and heavy-duty trucking industry.

Under ATA’s revised dues schedule, ATA member companies receive one free membership in each of the three ATA councils. Non-ATA member companies can no longer participate in council activities with the exception of TMC.

Beginning next year, TMC members whose employers are not ATA members will pay a $50 dues surcharge, making the cost of a TMC membership $335 a year. Additional memberships in TMC can be purchased for $75 for ATA members and $95 for non-ATA members.