Opinion: The Politics of Trucking Safety
The powerful chairman of the House Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee has decided that safety would be enhanced by moving regulation of the trucking industry from the Federal Highway Administration to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. During two recent news conferences, Mr. Wolf cited statistics that he claimed justify the transfer.
Trucking lobbyists moved swiftly to highlight inaccuracies in Mr. Wolf’s data and point out that the government’s own numbers show that the fatal accident rate for large trucks, as measured against the millions of miles they run on our highways, actually has improved significantly over the last decade. The industry considers this rate to be a true reflection of its exposure to potential accidents.
Nonetheless, the number of people killed in truck-related accidents has increased annually since 1995.
The congressman’s determination has put truck safety in the spotlight. And that ought to be an opportunity for the Department of Transportation and trucking to show just what they’ve done to make the highways safer.
Mr. Wolf announced that he’ll hold hearings on truck safety in early 1999. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) said he will hold hearings as well, and House Transportation Committee Chairman Bud Shuster (R-Pa.) is likely to follow suit.
The tone of those hearings will be shaped by public perception of the safety issue, and right now, anti-trucking groups appear to have the high ground. For trucking to avoid onerous new regulations, it needs to shape the debate. In political campaigns, this is known as defining the issue.
Mr. Wolf used his first press conference, in which he blasted trucking lobbyists for killing his OMC proposal, to portray himself as a lone voice standing up against evil special interests. His second media event at a Virginia inspection station played upon motorists’ concerns about the safety of trucks traveling the state’s overcrowded freeways. Joan Claybrook, savvy chairman of Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways, quickly joined the fray. She and her colleagues in the highway safety community took advantage of the negative coverage to convince the Department of Transportation to cancel its long-scheduled Truck and Bus Safety Summit. Ms. Claybrook followed up with an announcement of CRASH’s support for the transfer of OMC.
Trucking is beginning to weigh in. American Trucking Associations, the National Private Truck Council and other industry groups are getting the word out about the government’s positive truck safety statistics. More important in the perception game, the media are raising questions about the credibility of Ms. Claybrook’s numbers.
But the other major player in the debate has yet to be heard from. DOT has been, as ATA President Walter B. McCormick Jr. put it, deafeningly silent on its own efforts to improve truck safety.
That silence is a political decision. Trucking is just one of the department’s constituents. Safety groups are a politically potent force within DOT, as are the Teamsters union and the AFL-CIO. Further, trucking was a heavy contributor to Republicans in the past two elections, and since DOT is controlled by the Democratic White House, that may play into the agency’s political calculations.
The department is in an awkward position. It can’t comment without angering some of its constituents. But the failure of DOT’s leaders to respond is a disservice to its career employees. It cheapens the considerable efforts of the Office of Motor Carriers to promote truck safety.
he role of government is to balance competing interests and develop public policy based on facts. Unfortunately, most of the debate over Mr. Wolf’s OMC proposal has been emotional rhetoric. DOT has a responsibility to its ultimate constituent — the American public — to lay out the facts. Without the facts, how can an educated decision be made about OMC’s future?
