Up to 1,000 Mexican trucks and buses would be permitted to cross the border and use U.S. roadways for the next three years under a bill endorsed by a House panel Wednesday, May 2. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee voted 66-0 to restrict U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to opening the border to 100 carriers based in Mexico. They would be allowed to use a maximum of 1,000 vehicles under the pilot program.
The measure, sponsored by Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., also specifies criteria for the pilot program before it can start, including setting up an independent panel to evaluate the test program and getting certification from the Department’s independent Inspector General that safety and inspection requirements have been met. DeFazio told the Copley News Service that the legislation, which is slated to go to the full House, would “put much more scrutiny on this program than was proposed by the administration.”
Department of Transportation officials reacted to the bill’s approval by insisting they had met all the conditions laid out by Congress in 2001. “It is time to stop delaying a program that will be good for the American economy and implement the law that Congress passed 14 years ago,” DOT said in a statement.
In February, the agency first announced the proposed yearlong demonstration program to expand cross-border trucking operations with Mexico. The program is the latest attempt by the Bush administration to resolve the long-running dispute over Mexican trucks in the United States.
Under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, the United States was required to lift its ban on Mexican trucks, but the government delayed implementing that part of the agreement. Currently, Mexican trucks are allowed to enter a restricted zone in the United States, near the Mexican border, where they have to unload their cargo. It then is picked up by U.S. trucks.
Since the pilot program’s announcement in late February, members of the House and Senate, as well as several labor and environmental groups, have urged the department to provide additional information about the program and allow public comment. The pilot program also was criticized for first allowing Mexican trucks access to the United States before U.S. trucks would be granted similar privileges in Mexico.
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, the Teamsters Union, the Sierra Club, Public Citizen and the Environmental Law Foundation filed suit in a federal court last Tuesday, April 24, to block the project from going forward, citing safety and environmental concerns. The Mexican Senate, troubled by claims that U.S. trucks were on the verge of flooding the country, voted Wednesday, April 25, to negotiate a delay of the program until July, during which time it could be tweaked in various ways.
