Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/1044881
28 | Overdrive | November 2018 T he Minnesota Highway Patrol, the lead agency in the state's truck enforcement activities, didn't do much good for its reputation among truckers when it used a checklist intended to help determine an operator's fatigue level. In 2011, that checklist, also used in limited fashion in at least one other state at the time, was deemed an invasion of truckers' rights after a successful chal- lenge by the Owner-Operator Indepen- dent Drivers Association. Minnesota Highway Patrol repre- sentatives did not respond to requests for an interview, but some statistics and anecdotes suggest that in the wake of the fatigue judgment, some rehabilitation of the inspection program's reputation has been under way. It's come via a shift toward mobile traffi c enforcement and, perhaps, a willingness of offi cers to cred- it professionalism where it's due. Mustang's Truckin' independent owner-operator Mike Crawford, a past Overdrive Trucker of the Year based in Missouri, has had only one interaction with Minnesota enforcement in recent years in his many trips across the state. "It happened shortly after e-logs," he says, making reference to an inspection early this year after the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's electronic logging device mandate came into play. Pulled in at the Interstate 94 scale coming into Minnesota from Wisconsin, he says, "They said, 'You have electronic logs?' " Crawford, who's put down three million-plus safe miles in an ELD-man- date-exempt 1994 Freightliner, uses the Drivers Daily Log laptop software. He'd brought in printouts of his log book sheets for inspectors, arranging then to email the current day's sheet to the offi cer. "Man, look at these log sheets," said the inspecting offi cer, as Crawford recalls. "These things are fantastic. You can actually read them. You can under- stand them." "Having a cop tell me he's really im- pressed with my log book," trucker Kris Santoianni quips, "is like having a cop tell a bank robber he's really impressed with his bank account." But happen it did to him as well, likewise at a Minneso- ta scale house. That episode was chronicled in part in a February Overdrive feature, in which Santoianni noted the offi cer took a 30-day dive into his logs. The offi cer ul- timately lauded his professionalism, from the condition of his equipment to the neatness of his paper logs in a likewise ELD-exempt operation. Minnesota's standard operating procedure, evidenced in inspection data mined by Overdrive sister data company RigDig Business Intelligence, shows that such fi xed-facility inspections are not the most common checks in the Land of a Thousand Lakes. Rather, as La Crosse, Wisconsin resi- dent owner-operator Rob Hallahan has observed on his frequent runs north and west through the state, most of Minneso- ta's inspections are conducted away from the six fi xed weigh stations, whether at roadside pulloff s built for the purpose or elsewhere during traffi c stops. In 2017, six in every 10 inspections in Minnesota occurred as the result of a roadside stop. Hallahan says that unlike in many oth- er states, it's not uncommon to see com- mercial motor vehicle unit cars camped out in a median monitoring trucks' speeds or looking for other observable behaviors. "They'll set up on an exit ramp," he says, or "pull you over on a Sunday night in the middle of the night to check your log. I've seen them doing that, but I've never had any issues with Minnesota." As for violation statistics, Minneso- ta's relatively unremarkable outside of CSA's DATA TRAIL STANDOUT STATES Minnesota Minnesota aims at moving targets BY TODD DILLS Fixed-facility inspections are not the most common checks in Minnesota. Todd Dills