Senate Freezes Hours Plan

The Senate threw a major roadblock in the Department of Transportation’s drive to institute new hours-of-service rules for truckers.

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The legislators, by a vote of 99-to-0 on June 15, ordered DOT not to spend any money finalizing its revision of the hours rules, delaying any such plan until at least Oct. 1, 2001. The order is part of the Senate’s appropriations bill for federal transportation projects in the next fiscal year.

A House-Senate conference committee will take the Senate legislation and the House companion bill, and jointly iron out any differences – one of which is the moratorium on DOT’s hours proposal.

While the House package, passed earlier, did not attempt to block imposition of new regulations, at least one House leader on the issue signaled keen interest in what the Senate has done.

A spokesman for Rep. Bud Shuster (R-Pa.), chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the congressman “strongly supports the Senate action.” Scott Brenner said Shuster intended to make his support known during the conference committee sessions.

For the full story, see the June 19 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.