Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/687054
32 | Overdrive | June 2016 T he 2011 decision by a federal court to strike down the U.S. govern- ment's previous attempt at requiring truckers to use automatic recorders to track hours of service compliance not only removed the rule from federal regulatory code. It also came with a prescription for the U.S. Department of Transportation: Ensure the devices won't be used to harass truck operators, and get back with us. Back the agency has come, with a fresh mandate that devotes roughly a quarter of its length to anti-harassment measures. DOT also created a corre- sponding rule meant to block carriers from coercing truckers to drive in viola- tion of safety rules. However, also back is a fresh court challenge. It's likely to play out this year in the same court that struck down the 2012-eff ective mandate: the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. It was fi led by the same victorious plaintiff s: The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association and truckers Mark Elrod and Richard Pingel. This time, however, the truckers and their association-backed legal challenge harp on the devices' ability to track truckers in real time. Such personal tracking, despite being used in the course of commerce, violates truck operators' Fourth Amendment rights to privacy, the plaintiff s claim, and does little, if anything, to promote safety. The rule's proponents plan to fi ght OOIDA's challenge, arguing the rule in- tends only to track trucks and their drivers when they're on duty and that there's no central mechanism for monitoring drivers. Moreover, the rule's restriction of tracking precision to a one-mile radius of the truck doesn't constitute an encroachment of privacy, says DOT and the rule's backers. Duane DeBruyne, spokesperson for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, points to two provisions in the ELD rule's fi nal text as off ering appropriate safeguards for privacy. First, 2012's MAP-21 highway funding act "limits the way FMCSA can use ELD data," he says, saying the federal law restricts the agency's use solely to "the purpose of enforcing the regulation." Secondly, he says, when a truck oper- ator is using a vehicle for personal use, the location tracking accuracy expands to a 10-mile radius. Nevertheless, ELDs will be track- ing nearly all drivers' locations, says OOIDA Executive Vice President Todd Spencer. "It's unjustifi ed because simple hours of service compliance doesn't require tracking of drivers," he says. "They've tried to modify [the rule] a little bit to make it less intrusive, but it's still intrusive, and it's a violation, from what we contend. What's being pro- posed as the standard for drivers isn't even permissible for suspected felons without a court order." In its lawsuit, OOIDA argues the rule is a violation of protections set by the ELDs and privacy The mandate calls for tracking within a one-mile radius while on duty. Will the court throw it out on privacy grounds? BY James Jaillet The prospect of tracking not just driver hours of service, but the location of a truck and driver, lies at the heart of a challenge to the electronic logging device mandate.