The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration will hold the first of two public listening sessions Tuesday, January 12, to discuss a potential “beyond compliance” program for the trucking industry. Tuesday’s will be held in Louisville, Ky. See more info about its location here.
FMCSA, by direction of the 2015-passed FAST Act highway law, must develop a program to incentivize and reward carriers for implementing or investing in safety technology or programs that aren’t prescribed by law.
Just what measures will be rewarded — and what the rewards themselves will be — were not specified by the law and are in part the reason for the agency’s listening sessions: It wants to hear from carriers, drivers and others in the industry about what measures should count as “beyond compliance” and what the incentives/rewards may look like.
Suggestions by the agency and by Congress for rewards have included credits in FMCSA’s CSA program (some of which was hidden from public view by the same law dictating the beyond compliance program) as well as a reduction in the likelihood of inspection.
The agency will open a public comment period during the listening session Tuesday, which can be accessed at this link.