Later this year Comprehensive Safety Analysis (CSA) 2010 and its Safety Measurement System will replace the current Motor Carrier Safety Status Measurement System (SafeStat) used by regulators to identify and target unsafe operators. The new system has been in the works for many years, with testing occurring in several states since 2008.  With planned implementation in mid-2010, awareness, public outreach and chatter about the new system has reached critical levels.

There has been a lot of speculation on what data the new system will track and how it will affect carriers and drivers.  And, as with any change, many operators appear to be uneasy with the new system.  Well, I have good news––those operators and drivers who mind their Ps and Qs have little to worry about.  In fact, they may find some of the new tools made available through CSA 2010 useful.

Enforcement has always fought the uphill battle of resources versus tasks.  In simple terms, the current system uses enforcement, inspection and accident data to rank carriers based on size demographics, thereby identifying those carriers who pose the highest risk.  Enforcement would then commit resources to investigating and addressing these carriers via the on-site compliance review process.  The problem is (and has always been) that the number of operators/carriers needing attention far outweighs the resources available.

Enter CSA 2010.  The new Safety Measurement System (SMS) is really designed to simply do more with less.  It will provide enforcement personnel with a larger arsenal of tools to identify and assist carriers who are not performing well (i.e. complying with regulations), all while minimizing face-to-face time spent with each identified carrier.  Eventually, the system is designed to allow operators/carriers to have their Safety Rating (Safety Fitness Determination) evaluated and assigned on a monthly basis based purely on on-road safety performance and intervention findings.

The SMS is similar in many ways to Safestat, yet more detailed. On-road safety performance will be categorized into seven Behavioral Analysis Safety Improvement Categories (BASICs).  Each carrier’s results will be compared to demographic-determined peers and those with the poorest scores in each category will be targeted for intervention actions.  The detail in which the data collected is categorized will help regulators more specifically identify areas where a carrier is having issues.  Intermediate interventions, such as warning letters to carriers, are designed to evoke carrier action and response to correct identified issues before issues escalate to the point where an on-site compliance review is warranted. In addition to carrier rankings, regulators will also be keeping tabs on individual driver history which should allow for more effective targeted roadside enforcement inspections as well as assist in identifying carriers who have a propensity to use drivers with less than stellar histories.

In short, CSA 2010 will allow for more detailed attention to be paid to more carriers.  This should be nothing new to passenger carriers, who have been under the microscope now for several years.  This scrutiny won’t change with the implementation of CSA 2010.  In fact, under the SMS, passenger carriers will have lower intervention thresholds than property carriers and fewer intervention steps before on-site, full-blown compliance reviews are triggered.

CSA 2010 poses some potentially big benefits for those carriers who play by the rules.  For one, driver safety performance histories compiled will be available for carriers to use during the applicant screening process.  This can provide additional insight into a potential driver’s behaviors, honesty, and propensity to follow established rules and processes – which, not surprisingly, have all be linked to crash risk.  Likewise, the new system could potentially alert operators of a current driver who has not been forthcoming with information related to traffic or regulatory violations.

And finally, it should allow for those operators with issues to be identified more quickly and appropriate actions to be taken if they aren’t corrected.  For those that play by the rules and manage their drivers, fleet and compliance functions well, there really shouldn’t be any additional enforcement or regulatory scrutiny—in fact, there may be even less.  If CSA 2010 works as designed, more enforcement personnel time will be able to be devoted to safety data collection and roadside enforcement.  And more eyes and feet on the roadways is what is ultimately needed to catch and curtail illegal operations, and prevent unnecessary accidents and negative publicity for the passenger carrier industry.

Matthew A. Daecher is president and CEO of Daecher Consulting Group, Inc., Camp Hills, CA.

“Safety is our highest priority,” says U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “This new rule says we are serious about having safe trucks and buses on the road.  This is important for those behind the wheels of these big rigs and those who share the road with them.”

“This new rule helps to ensure that only the safest carriers can enter the industry and continue to operate on our roadways,” says FMCSA Administrator Anne S. Ferro. “By strengthening the new entrant process, our agency supports new carriers as they establish and maintain critical safety management controls that enable them to operate in full compliance with federal safety regulations.”

Under the new requirements, a newly registered truck or bus company will automatically fail its safety audit if FMCSA inspectors discover violations of any one of 16 essential federal regulations. These regulations cover controlled substances and alcohol testing, hours-of-service rules, driver qualifications, vehicle condition and carrier insurance responsibility.

FMCSA says failure to pass a new entrant safety audit may result in the revocation of a carrier’s registration unless that carrier takes corrective action within the specified time period. Additionally, if administration agents discover certain violations during roadside inspections, the new carrier may be subject to an expedited safety audit or a compliance review that can result in fines or an out-of-service order.

For more information on the New Entrant Safety Assurance Process rule, visit the FMCSA Web site at www.fmcsa.dot.gov.

I do not need a crystal ball to tell me what comes to mind for most bus company owners when they hear the word compliance. I already know they would say DOT regulations.

If I asked what comes to mind when they hear the word accountability, they would probably say something about the consequences of not complying with DOT regulations. I have to agree with their correlation of compliance and accountability. The brave souls in the transportation industry know DOT compliance is mandatory and that they will pay the price for non-compliance.

Most company owners accept responsibility to comply so they will never have to face the consequences. Without accountability or never having to face the legal ramifications of operating outside the regulations, I do not think many owners would work as diligently as they do to stay compliant.

Many rules go unnoticed

The fact is many of the rules in the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations go unnoticed, unheeded and often unchecked. The outcome of a DOT compliance review often hinges on only a small fraction of those regulations, and I see the unintended results all too frequently.

Regulations for which accountability is little to none make it easier for an operator not to comply — that is if he is even aware of the more obscure regulations. This may sound familiar to anyone unfortunate enough to experience litigation related to an injury accident. While the inspectors may not hold an operator accountable for every DOT regulation during a compliance review, a knowledgeable attorney will certainly ensure such accountability during a lawsuit.

From a risk management point of view, management must consider all matters concerning compliance and accountability in a greater context than merely adhering to agency regulations. Replace the word regulation with policy and compliance is as important to viable risk management as it is to the legalities.

Driver performance and behavior

Every company develops its own rules and policies to influence employee behavior. In a transportation company the more common policies and rules deal with driver performance and behavior — from attendance, procedures and paperwork to customer service and safe driving. Drivers in violation of the prescribed standards are accountable for their actions, or at least they should be. Frequent infractions may certainly result in the loss of their job and possibly end their career. A company that does not hold drivers and all other employees accountable for non-compliance with the established rules and regulations cannot successfully manage its risk.

However, accountability should not end with drivers and other front-line employees. Company policy must hold everyone in the organization accountable for their actions and performance. Many operations falter when they fail to apply this concept to the managerial ranks. I frequently see managers who have become lazy, or who interpret policies to fit their needs where there often is little consequence for not complying with an established policy, particularly in companies with multiple operating locations. There is no reason to view performance of management any differently than drivers.

Effective risk management requires properly executed policy combined with consistent accountability throughout the entire organization. Making some policies or processes more important than others can easily sidetrack even companies with strong organizational accountability. Adherence to policy can get difficult during times of hardship, which makes compliance easy to overlook. Such behavior only increases risk, especially if an overlooked policy directly affects safe operations. It also sends the message that it is okay to not comply. Such a practice will systematically reduce the overall effectiveness of a risk management program by defeating the intent and effectiveness of the policies established to reduce the risks.

The concept of organizational accountability is vital to any effective risk program.

To achieve accountability throughout an organization, companies must implement specific policies that measure performance and compliance at every level, and spell out the consequences for failure to comply with the requirements of the established policy.

Matthew A. Daecher is president and CEO of Daecher Consulting Group, Inc., Camp Hills, PA.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) uses the word reincarnated to describe out of service operators who have returned in no better shape than when they left to do business under a new identity.

What little I know of karma and reincarnation, it is too wondrous a concept to apply to someone who flies under the radar and slinks around through the loopholes to gain a new lease on life. In my estimation coach operators of this ilk are more akin to a virus that mutates to escape the antibiotic. The threat grows deadlier with each iteration of the strain.

Word games aside, coach carriers have been speaking out on these practices for years, and operators I have talked to are pleased to see the federal agencies doing more to address their complaints.

Examined records

GAO recently set out to determine the number of new entrant coach carriers registered with FMCSA in 2007 and 2008 that are essentially previous out of service carriers, and to identify new entrants with connections to non-compliant carriers placed out of service. The office examined the records of 67 motorcoach accidents over the last 10 years and determined that 15 carriers with a history of significant safety violations caused one-half of all the onboard fatalities and should not have been doing business.

Of roughly 220 companies fined and ordered out of service, GAO identified no less than 20 offenders in at least nine states who had evaded compliance by reopening under a new name. Violations ranged from operating without the proper license to failing to test drivers for illegal drugs and alcohol. GAO says more could be out there, but it had no way to identify those who purposely gave FMCSA deceptive information. GAO says the number of violators is likely higher, since the office only identified companies based on exact matches of information.

FMCSA maintains these rogue tactics are relatively easy to pull off and difficult to detect, leaving the carriers to continue to operate as safety risks.

More bite into enforcement

However, the administration told BUSRide it is working diligently to put more bite into its registration and enforcement policies by strengthening its oversight of federal operating authority applications, and has already made changes to the application processes designed to block rogue operators showing up under a new USDOT authority.

Since August 2008, FMCSA says it has conducted additional vetting of applications of all motorcoach companies entering the industry. Of the more than 800 carriers that have applied for USDOT operating authority since this initiative began, the administration has denied authority to one carrier determined to come back in a new form, and dismissed 100 applications for failing to provide the information necessary to complete the vetting process. An additional 17 companies opted to withdraw their applications.

In addition, FMCSA says it is continuing to reduce the time it takes to conduct the initial safety audit of motorcoach entrants.

“Federal law requires new carriers to undergo a new-entrant safety audit within 18 months of the company commencing operations,” says an FMCSA spokesperson.  “FMCSA internal policy directs that safety audits be conducted within nine months, while in reality, most are completed within five months.”

Meanwhile, California is taking matters into its own hands with two recently introduced Assembly Bills. AB 636, The Passenger Charter Carriers Act requires an operator to obtain certification from the Public Utilities Commission or be permanently revoked from offering carrier service. The associated AB 951 deems non-compliance and any violation of any order from the commission as a crime, and imposes much stiffer penalties for a host of infractions by non-compliant operators and drivers who could face hefty fines and suspensions of service for up to five years.

As one prominent California coach operator puts it: Justice moves, albeit slowly.

With the federal transportation agencies catching it from all sides, the announcement by DOT Secretary Ray LaHood for a full departmental review of motorcoach safety certainly touched a nerve in one operator in Texas.

When I walked into my office early one morning in June, the message light was blinking especially bright. The caller was responding to my column on safety and the Secretary’s good intention. He said he had something to add and would I please call.

That I did. He said he was actually reading BUSRide while standing in line at a Dairy Queen, and felt compelled to relinquish his space to chime in on the accelerated move by DOT to get its arms around the issues once and for all.
His beef over inspectors not doing enough to curb the ubiquitous rogue operators was one I have heard from several different industry sources, and interestingly, a number of other Texas operators — The good want the bad and the ugly off the road.

The trouble with motorcoach inspections as he sees it — and he was adamant in telling me — is any rogue operator that really needs a good going over rarely gets one. I told him I would look into it.

He says state inspectors for DOT are doing what they can to make their job easy, performing compliance reviews and meeting their quotas by beating a path to only the most compliant coach companies whose ducks are always in a row.

From what I am hearing from a variety of industry sources, the gentleman on the phone is bang on when he says the inspectors need to get off their duffs and checkout the rogues running loose. After all, the purpose of the inspection is not to ensure the most compliant stay that way, but to root out the dangerous, non-compliant operators for the safety of others.

The industry has been pushing for inspectors to perform their compliance reviews in all the right places instead of settling for the most convenient places.

Its wish is for the DOT to hold states to higher standards, and hold them accountable for more stringent practices as a condition to receive the federal funds to conduct inspections on its behalf.

Basically, the DOT inspection is a paper review, unlike the Department of Defense (DOD) that inspects at least a percentage of the fleet in addition to the overall quality of company operations.

With 438 DOD-certified bus and motorcoach companies, the question posed to DOT is why go out and review companies already inspected by DOD? Another suggestion from the industry is that DOT recognize and accept all DOD inspections, as they are equivalent or even surpass DOT standards, and give more focus to companies not on the DOD list.

My man back at the Dairy Queen is exactly right. As concerned as most operators are about non-compliant operators carrying passengers in unsafe equipment, they are most happy to alert the inspection teams to the whereabouts of bad operators blatantly running with seeming immunity.

Texas is not alone. The prevailing attitude of inspectors in all but about eight states is that it just takes more time and effort to confront them. With so many knowing who they are and the most likely places to find them, it is clear that inspectors are not doing enough to go after the companies operating under the radar, check them and enforce existing regulations.

I am told FMCSA has the addresses of most passenger carriers, so it should not be that difficult for inspectors to call on any operator they have not seen for sometime, and respond to the clues, hints and tips of those not on the list.

The hope is that a more robust Motorcoach Safety Action Plan would not saddle the best operators with any greater burden while the unsafe and non-compliant culprits are still running loose.

Doesn’t sic’ em mean anything to anyone anymore?

In its summation of the Mexican Hat crash of January 2008 that killed nine passengers, the decision by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) to also bring the hammer down on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has stirred a smoldering fire.

NTSB voted unanimously to cite the NHTSA for failing to implement recommendations that could already have lead to new safety equipment on buses, including seatbelts and stronger roofs and windows.This comes on top of pinpointing driver fatigue as the primary cause of the crash.

For whatever reason regulators at the Department of Transportation have been saying while they are working on making motorcoaches safer, they cannot rush the process.

Inadequate regulations

Responding in the press, former NTSB chairman Jim Hall noted back in 1999 he received the same response whe he presented NHTSA a study to show bus safety regulations were inadequate. He says for the previous 10 years NHTSA had dragged its feet on nearly every recommendation NTSB made regarding motorcoach safety.

“Ten years ago NTSB recommended new safety standards that would require strengthened roofs, easy-to-open windows, and possibly seatbelt restraints,” he writes. Had NHTSA taken our recommendations seriously, crash-protection systems would have been required on all motorcoaches years ago. But NHTSA balked and decades later the studies continue with no rule-making to show for them.”

Acting NTSB chairman Mark V. Rosenker concurs, saying the current scene reminds him of NHTSA 50 years ago. “They started making impotant safety improvements in automobiles,” he says. “Essentially nothing has been done for motorcoaches.”

NTSB says the delay by NHTSA no doubt contributed to the severity of the Mexican Hat crash. In this case the roof of the motorcoach sheared off and everyone was thrown out except the driver who was wearing only seatbelt, and one passenger pinned between seats.

NTSB also criticized the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), claiming it had yet to act on recommendations an outside advisory had issued for more stringent driver medical certifications, which included a more thorough examination of the effects of sleep apnea. The FMCSA reported back to say it was reviewing the recommendations and supplementing them with additional research.

The collective voice is going to get louder

Meanwhile, bus accident victims are pressing the government to be more aggressive. Ironic but sad, at this moment as I am writing, the news of yet another fatal motorcoach accident in northern California is on the screen. The collective voice is only going to get louder, and the fire is breaking into a six-alarm emergency.

More irony at this moment as I just received the DOT press release of April 30 announcing the order by U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood for a full departmental review of motorcoach safety.

Secretary LaHood says a departmental motorcoach safety action plan will be created from the findings, and will outline the additional steps needed to improve motorcoach safety. The review will also consider outstanding NTSB recommendations to U.S. DOT. The full report will be released in August.

Maybe the nightmare of building and operating motorcoaches without U.S. standards will soon be over. Still the danger at this point for the industry and its passengers is the compulsion to rush to judgment. The next step cannot be knee jerk atonement for time lost, nor merely a reactionary response to public outcry.

As the DOT now attempts to accelerate its plan to end the turmoil, the public has to realize there is more to this than seat belts. If DOT follows all recommendations, it will decide on at least seven separate rules. Seat belts for openers, but the agenda also includes roof and sidewall strength, advanced glazing requirements, emergency passenger egress standards, fire prevention and suppression, electronic onboard recorders and electronic stability controls.

At this juncture it would be negligent of the government and this industry to promote standards that skirt real science and sound engineering principles, and fail to encompass all the factors that affect motorcoach safety. Anything less will only cost more lives at even greater expense, time and effort.