Letters: Horse-Moving Bill, ‘Gator Back Peels,’ More About Brokers

These Letters to the Editor appear in the July 18 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

Horse-Moving Bill

In your article about bill number S. 1281 on July 4 [“Bill Would Ban Moving Horses in Multiple-Level Truck Trailers,” p. 27], the focus should have been on safe transport, not on banning one specialized form of transportation.

The primary issue when handling performance horses for specialty use such as rodeos must be the safety of the trailer, i.e., headroom, roadworthiness, safety, etc.

Accidents can happen. However, professional stock contractors do everything possible to ensure that accidents do not happen.

In a recent survey of horse-trailer accidents, the data showed the main causes are lack of proper maintenance, operator error and equipment mismatch. News regarding accidents involving double-deck trailers do not appear frequently, as these types of accidents are rare.

Rodeo horses must be fit and able to perform when they arrive at their performance destination. Thousands of horses are successfully transported each year in specially modified double-deck trucks to more than 600 sanctioned rodeos and many more local events throughout the country.

Rodeo stock contractors that own bucking horses use double-deck trailers that are specially ordered or specifically modified in order to safely transport the stock that they haul.

Generally, stock contractors have one level created with a higher clearance (up to at least 84 inches). The level with the lower floor-to-ceiling clearance is used to haul cattle or bulls for the rodeo events.

The average height of a horse is about 60 inches. Floor-to-ceiling clearance in most double-deck level trailers used to haul bucking horses range from 71 to 75 inches. This leaves 11 to 15 inches of headroom for the average horse in these specially modified trailers, which is more than adequate for the protection of the animal.

Taller horses usually are hauled in the single-level areas at the front and back of the modified trailers, which have about 9 feet of floor-to-ceiling clearance.

The majority of bucking horses used in professional rodeos today come from breeding programs where they are specifically bred to buck. These horses are conditioned to ride in specially modified double-level trailers from an early age and are acclimated to this safe form of transportation.

Rodeos are a part of Americana in thousands of communities across the United States and an important generator of revenue for nonprofit organizations ranging from 4-H clubs to community hospitals. Each and every rodeo is vitally dependent on the safe and efficient transportation of rodeo stock. There are some 80 professional stock contractor transportation companies operating in the United States, all of which are small, family-owned businesses.

In these difficult economic times, rodeo is thriving, as Americans are looking for value in entertainment and an event the whole family can afford and enjoy. There are numerous organizations and nonprofit groups that would be unfairly penalized as rodeo sponsors should S. 1281 be enacted.

Fletcher Hall

Chairman and CEO

F.R. Hall & Associates LLC

Potomac, Md.

Editor’s Note: Fletcher Hall is the former executive director of the Agricultural & Food Transporters Conference of American Trucking Associations. He is government relations consultant for the Professional Rodeo Stock Contractors Association.

‘Gator Back Peels’

The purpose of this letter is to take exception to the statement by Quintin Marx of New World Van Lines that was printed in the article “Monitoring Air Pressure Is Key to Savings,” from the June 20 issue of Transport Topics (p. 12).

The statement that we object to is:

“ ‘It eliminates gator back peels,’ he said, referring to instances when the tread on a recapped tire comes off. ‘That is strictly caused by heat and underinflation. We never have underinflation.’ “

Although I personally believe that PSI [pounds per square inch] systems are a great help toward better tire maintenance, it is important for your readers to know that when they see tire treads lying on the highway, they might just as easily have come from virgin tires that have never been retreaded.

Heat and underinflation are indeed the enemy of tires, but to blame a retread for road gators is the same as blaming a vehicle for an accident caused by a drunk driver. The blame is simply misplaced.

Unfortunately, retreads are the Rodney Dangerfields of the tire industry — meaning they “don’t get no respect” — and that is a battle we fight every day, but the facts are different from most peoples’ perceptions.

Today’s top-quality retreads perform with an adjustment rate as low — and often actually lower — than the best major-brand new tires. Thanks to new nondestructive testing technology and improvements in rubber compounds and tread designs, a retread produced by a top-quality retreader offers better value than comparable, higher-priced new tires — and retreads are more environmentally friendly.

Here is an offer to any of your readers who doubts what I have written: Let us arrange for you to visit a modern retread plant in your area, and if you don’t come away convinced that retreads are not the cause of road gators, whether you use retreads or not, we will write a $100 check to your favorite charity in your name and send it with no questions asked.

Harvey Brodsky

Managing Director

Retread Tire Association

Pacific Grove, Calif.

More About Brokers

I am writing in response to recent letters that suggest a carrier can currently broker out interstate loads under his or her interstate motor carrier authority.

This is a myth not supported by law.

Under federal law and regulation, interstate carriers cannot broker out a load under their own motor carrier authority without first having obtained a property broker license, commonly referred to as “freight broker authority.”

A property broker registration is required under 49 USC §13901, and more specifically, 49 USC §13904. This enabling legislation affords the U.S. secretary of transportation the right to engage in rulemaking and to promulgate rules for brokers. The secretary has delegated this rulemaking authority to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

FMCSA’s rules for brokers are codified at 49 CFR 371. Under subdivision 2 of that section, a broker is defined as: “A person who, for compensation, arranges, or offers to arrange, the transportation of property by an authorized motor carrier.”

Motor carriers — or persons who are employees or bona fide agents of carriers — are not brokers within the meaning of this section when they arrange or offer to arrange the transportation of shipments that they are authorized to transport and that they have accepted and are legally bound themselves to transport.

FMCSA further clarifies this issue at: www.fmcsa.dot.gov/about/other/faq/faqs.aspx#question9

While a carrier can “dispatch” a load to a leased owner-operator, that load is not being brokered, as the load is being moved under the carrier’s own operating authority, bill of lading and insurance. Bona fide brokering under the FMCSA’s definition occurs only when a duly licensed third-party property broker places a load for compensation on behalf of a shipper with a duly authorized motor carrier.

Under current law, if you are a carrier that earns money for the placement of a load with another carrier, you are already required to obtain your own broker’s license. The newly proposed “Fighting Fraud in Transportation Act” (H.R. 2357) recently introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives is therefore not needed to make this a requirement.

James Lamb

STB/FMC Licensed Transportation Practitioner

President

DOTAuthority.com and Association of Independent Property Brokers & Agents

Morristown, N.J.