LEWISTON, Maine – A truck safety activist and founder of Parents Against Tired Truckers is criticizing U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, for provisions Collins wants to add to to federal budget bill that would loosen rest standards for the nation’s truck drivers.
Daphne Izer, the mother of a teen who was killed — along with three of his friends — by a trucker who fell asleep at the wheel in October 1993, said Collins’ support for a change to the federal hours of service rule will put lives at risk.
“If my loving son Jeff had been killed in an airplane crash involving a fatigued pilot, Congress would take swift and direct action to improve air traffic safety,” Izer said in a statement issued Wednesday. “Yet, his death, like so many of the preventable deaths happening each year in crashes involving tired truckers, occurred on just an ordinary day in a small town and did not result in any change in policy protections.”
Izer said instead, Congress was “turning its back on families like mine and rolling back an important safety rule to prevent overworked and overtired truckers from jeopardizing the safety of everyone.”
The issue of tired truckers drew new national attention last June after a high-profile crash in New Jersey involving a truck claimed the life of comic James McNair, who went by the stage name Jimmy Mack.
But Collins has argued the regulations she wants to change make the roads safer and not more dangerous because they allow truckers to travel more in the early morning hours and before other commuters and travelers are on the highways.
Collins won overwhelming support for the changes in the Senate’s Appropriations Committee with a 21-9 vote earlier this year.
New rules implemented in 2013 require truck drivers to take two consecutive periods of rest between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. after they have worked 70 hours. Collins’ change still requires at least one 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. “restart” per week.
Rules that disallow a trucker from driving more than 60 hours in any 7-day period or 70 hours in any 8-day period remain in place.
All other limits on drivers including mandatory off-duty hours and rest periods would remain in place. The change, according to Collins would allow truckers the flexibility to move their vehicles more frequently when roads are less congested.
Collins’ proposed amendment to the budget bill would also provide $4 million for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to conduct a study of the restart provision as it pertains to safety, health and driver fatigue.
But truck safety advocates like Izer said the change would allow the trucking industry to push drivers to work more on less sleep. Under the change, drivers could have up to 82 hours of on-duty time before getting two full days of rest.
Critics say Collins was influenced by the industry and the changes she wants were not vetted publicly in Congress or even looked at by the committees that regulate transportation. Instead, a budget-writing panel reviewed the proposal changes.
“Our nation already suffers 4,000 deaths annually and more than 100,000 injuries. The trucking industry overrode this strong public opposition by cashing in on its financial support to elected officials,” Joan Claybrook, chairwoman of the advocacy group Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways, said in a prepared statement also issued Wednesday. “Sen. Collins has now guaranteed that truck driver fatigue will continue to be a growing problem. Our drivers are being driven to death.”
Collins has said the changes she wants are narrow and intended to improve highway safety not diminish it.
According to information provided by Collins’ staff, the change would do nothing to other rules including: required minimum off-duty hours, limits on total daily driving hours, mandatory meal and rest breaks, sleeper berth requirements or electronic on-board monitors. The change also would not affect any current federal exemptions for hours of service rules, according to Collins’ staff.
A previous proposal by Maine’s 2nd District U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud, a Democrat, would have delayed all the new changes implemented in 2013.
Collins’ proposal only undoes two of the rule changes and only for one year while the issue is studied fully by the federal government, Kevin Kelley, a spokesman for Collins, said Wednesday.
“I care deeply about safety on our nation’s roads, and no one wants to see an accident caused by driver fatigue or by any other cause,” Collins said, also in a prepared statement Wednesday. “What has become clear is that new federal rules, implemented last year, have presented some unintended and unanticipated consequences that are not in the best interest of public safety, truck drivers, or the businesses and consumers who depend on their services.”
Collins said her provision provides temporary relief from a regulation that is forcing trucks onto the highways when the are most congested, “during a time when commuters are traveling to work and children are traveling to school.”