FMCSA Reform, Freight In Road Bill, Shuster Says
The highway bill a House panel is scheduled to consider Oct. 22 will include provisions intended to boost freight connectivity and enhance accountability at the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, Rep. Bill Shuster said in an exclusive interview with Transport Topics.
“The delivery of consumer goods and critical links in the supply chain — including first- and last-mile connections to other modes of transportation — almost always involve the highway system. That’s why the surface transportation legislation we will soon introduce will focus on the safe, efficient transportation of freight,” said Shuster, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
Several days before the hearing, Shuster is scheduled to speak at American Trucking Associations’ Management Conference & Exhibition in Philadelphia.
Shuster told TT the highway bill would look to streamline the permitting process and enhance funding opportunities for states and municipalities seeking to advance infrastructure projects.
The bill will take aim at FMCSA’s regulatory and enforcement programs, which Shuster said do not keep up with advances in business practices and technological innovations.
“Our committee is working with the importance of connectivity and the efficient transport of freight very much in mind,” Shuster said. “As we move forward with the [highway] bill, our committee is looking to make several reforms to the agency to provide more transparency in its rulemaking process, and to improve fairness and accountability in its enforcement programs.”
Earlier this year, Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), chairwoman of the Commerce panel with jurisdiction over trucking policies, introduced legislation aimed at addressing frivolous litigation that is based on FMCSA’s Compliance, Safety, Accountability scoring program. Fischer and other key Republicans have noted recent Government Accountability Office findings that concluded FMCSA demonstrated challenges in its reliability of CSA’s safety measurement system in predicting carrier crashes.
Shuster’s panel in the House has jurisdiction over highway policy but not the funding for programs. The tax-writing Ways and Means Committee has jurisdiction over the bill’s funding structure, which at this point remains unclear.
“They continue to consider options for funding the legislation,” Shuster said, of his tax-writing colleagues.
Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is tasked with assigning a stream of funding for the road-building Highway Trust Fund, but Republicans in his caucus have been demanding his attention, insisting he run for House speaker. Ryan and his counterparts in the Senate had been in talks to advance an international tax package to back highway programs. That plan has yet to materialize.
Several senators, meanwhile, have been urging Shuster to use the bill the Senate passed in July as a model for his bill. The Senate bill would authorize highway programs for six years and fund those programs for three years. As of press time, the House panel had yet to unveil its version.
“I know the House can pass a strong transportation bill. . . . We must pass a multiyear transportation bill without delay,” Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), the ranking minority member on the Senate transportation committee, wrote to the top Republican and Democrat in the House on Oct. 14.
Much of the industry applauded Shuster for scheduling the markup. American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials President Paul Trombino III told TT shortly after the markup was scheduled Oct. 14, that it was “tremendous” to learn the House will consider the reauthorization.
“The size of the funding will be of interest, and I’m pretty interested in the freight side,” he said. “Freight is obviously one of the big things that a lot of the states are focused on.”
Since current federal highway funding authority expires Oct. 29, Shuster and other transportation leaders are expected to advance a short-term funding fix this month. Since 2009, Congress has approved 34 such funding extensions.
