Costly Fees, Red Tape Discourage Drivers from Getting Hazmat Credentials, Hill Told

This story appears in the May 9 print edition of Transport Topics.

Multiple security background checks and costly fees have caused the population of truck drivers with Transportation Security Administration hazardous materials endorsements to decline by roughly 1.2 million since 2004, a top American Trucking Associations official told a congressional subcommittee last week.

“Using TSA’s own numbers, there were approximately 2.7 million commercial drivers with HMEs in 2004,” Martin Rojas, ATA’s vice president of security and operations, told the House Subcommittee on Transportation Security. “Today, after having already completed a full cycle of HME renewals on the truck driver population, there are approximately 1.5 million commercial drivers with HMEs.”

In a May 4 hearing to examine legislation to streamline TSA’s security credentialing process, Rojas said the decline in the number of drivers with HMEs was not a result of applicants being disqualified during the screening process.

Fewer than 1% of applicants have received final disqualification letters, and those letters have mostly been issued because the “drivers did not understand and avail themselves of the screening program’s appeal and waiver process,” Rojas said.

“ATA believes that the reduced number of HME holders is due primarily to the costs and the burden on commercial drivers of the fingerprinting and application process for getting an HME,” Rojas said. “Some trucking companies with a small percentage of hazardous materials loads have even stopped transporting such cargo to avoid burdening their drivers with the HME screening.”

Rojas said the House bill introduced last week, the Modern Security Credentials Act, would go a long way to reduce multiple federal background checks and fees for truckers seeking security credentials to gain admittance to U.S. seaports and transport hazardous materials.

“Our industry has long supported a national, uniform process to check a commercial driver’s criminal history,” Rojas said. “However, the present multiplicity of background checks for commercial drivers, and their associated costs, creates a significant challenge for the recruitment and retention of qualified drivers.”

Currently, all drivers who service U.S. ports are required to obtain a Transportation Worker Identification Credential, which requires a background check. If the same drivers also want to haul hazmat, they must receive another background check to obtain an HME.

“This bill would eliminate the requirement for a security screening as part of an HME,” said Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of the subcommittee and author of the legislation. “It would instead require those truck drivers who are transporting materials that could have a security nexus to acquire one credential, a TWIC.”

It also would ideally reduce the waiting time for a TWIC and remove a requirement that drivers who haul such materials as paint, hair spray or soda syrup obtain a hazmat endorsement, Rogers said.

The bill would require TSA to issue a rule that would “consolidate and harmonize” the agency’s security-threat assessment process for transportation workers.

It also would allow TSA to pass cost savings on to transportation workers by lowering fees for a TWIC, Rogers said.

Stephen Sadler, deputy assistant administrator, TSA Transportation Threat Assessment and Credentialing, testified that the agency shares the goal of Congress and stake-holders that threat-assessment programs should be “harmonized to alleviate the burden and inconvenience placed on individuals by the need to obtain multiple credentials.”

Sadler said the agency is working on a “person-centric” rule that would streamline the process and eliminate multiple background checks.

“What that means is we’ll be able to manage an individual from the time they enroll to the time they get issued a benefit,” Sadler told the subcommittee. “Therefore, if you need a hazmat endorsement, you don’t just have to apply for hazmat. If you need a TWIC, you don’t just have to apply for a TWIC.”

John Conley, president of National Tank Truck Carriers, said the declining number of drivers with hazmat endorsements is making it more difficult for some tank-truck carriers to recruit drivers.

“I think there were a number of drivers, when it came time to renew, they just didn’t do it,” Conley told Transport Topics. “The cost is one thing, but I think it’s mostly the hassle.”

Conley said that prior to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the hazmat endorsement was a knowledge test. “It was after they made it a knowledge test and a character test that it became a real problem,” Conley said.

“There are cases where a driver can go to the same facility to get both a TWIC and an endorsement and will have to go to two different rooms and give two sets of fingerprints — which is just ludicrous. Try to explain to the driver why that makes sense,” Conley said.

In a related development, TSA last month said it intends to streamline its corporate security review program, eliminating hazmat carriers who already are subjected to security reviews by the Department of Transportation.

During site visits by DOT, carriers are required to demonstrate they have adequate security controls of physical assets and personnel, said Boyd Stephenson, manager of security and cross-border operations for ATA.