Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/671314
Lesson Learned says. "He was pissed that he had been through it the day before." Ultimately, the offi cer detained the truck for a few hours by issuing two out-of-service violations — one for a fl at tire, and another for improper securement. Of what, you ask? Improper securement of the oil jugs bungee'd next to the frame rail be- hind the cab. In conversation with DeLullo later, he says, "The cop told, 'he wasn't nice,'" referring to the driver. "And I said, 'Well this is how this works, I guess – this isn't about safety. This is about just how nice you can be.'" What it all boils down to, DeLullo says, is as increasing employment of "gotcha-type methods of enforce- ment," an attitute of "me against you. I say in any great relationship, it can't be a 'me against you' proposi- tion. As it is, this is the DOT and the federal government against me in this business. I'm 50 years old, and I don't see why I want to continue to do this." The central point of the problem, as DeLullo sees it, is that the increas- ingly adversarial relationship, the gotcha attitudes and methods he's seeing, is producing the data that is then being used at the highest levels of the CSA ranking/scoring program to produce the scores that carriers are being judged on. His thoughts on it all are a defi nite variation on the old "garbage in, garbage out" phrase to describe systems doomed by the Bob DeLullo started in trucking as a driver in 1986, he says. Since then, he believes, most aspects of the business of trucking have improved — from equipment to pay and image, however slightly in some cases. "But regulation is going haywire. … The regs side of this business is the single big- gest issue we have." 20 www.studentdriverplacement.com May '16