Trucking Companies File Suit for Stay on CSA
Trucking companies are galvanizing their efforts to shield critical truck safety data from the public. A coalition of trucking companies has now filed a lawsuit that seeks to shield certain parts of CSA 2010, the new trucking safety management system that will soon begin to take effect. The coalition comprises of the National Association Of Small Trucking Companies and the Expedite Alliance of North America. The group has now filed a lawsuit in federal court for a stay on parts of the CSA that would release trucking company safety scores to the public.
That is in spite of the fact that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has already amended some of the rules to withhold certain critical data, including the Cargo-related and the Crash Indicator BASIC scores from the public. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has already made other concessions to placate the trucking companies’ concerns. One of these concerns is about the language used to categorize trucking companies on the agency's website. Carriers are especially concerned about the language that is used to describe carriers who fail to reach certain BASIC benchmarks. The agency has since dropped the term “deficient” to describe a carrier, and replaced it with the milder term “alert.”
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has also assured carriers that it will use a disclaimer on its website that will caution users against misusing the scores. That's obviously a nod to the carrier concerns that these scores being made available to the public, would open them up to truck accident claims.
Although the FMCSA has bent over backwards to accommodate carrier concerns, the trucking companies are showing no indication that they intend to back down anytime soon. As Indiana truck accident lawyers, we are concerned that the FMCSA seems to be overly eager to placate carriers. The agency's primary concern should be making available critical safety information to the public, not soothing carrier fears which have been blown out of proportion.
