4 Oregon Trucking Association, Inc. Oregon Truck Dispatch FROM THE PRESIDENT Jana Jarvis OTA President/CEO WE OFTEN TALK about OTA’s advocacy work, but what that looks like on a day-to-day basis is as varied as the daily activities of our team. For example, today I’m writing this column as I fly home to Portland from a quick trip to Washington, D.C. where, as one of a handful of women executives running a state trucking association, I met with ATA to discuss how we can leverage state leadership diversity with our national advocacy efforts. There are now 15 women state executives as a part of the national trucking federation, and we have a unique opportunity to influence policymakers’ perspectives about diversity in our industry. So, beyond the wings of a transcontinental Washington, D.C. to Portland flight, what does that advocacy look like? And why should you care? Trucking is on the precipice of great change. Prior to the 1980’s, trucking had been a highly regulated industry. The flood of available labor during the Great Depression moved disaffected farmers and others into hauling freight to make ends meet. ATA, which had been formed only a handful of years prior, was concerned, along with the railroads, that falling freight rates by an abundance of emerging trucking businesses would negatively affect the freight industry and they pushed for control over these unpredictable market conditions. The result was the Motor Carrier Act of 1935 that established routes and rates and carefully controlled who participated in the industry. Only 17,000 carrier participants were allowed to haul freight across the U.S. (as compared to over one million carriers today) and these established routes could easily sell for close to a million dollars in the 1970’s. A free market did not exist in the trucking industry for several decades. But economic conditions in the late 70’s pushed government leaders to rethink this strategy. Heavy unionization and strong regulation limiting participants had kept driver wages strong and companies highly profitable. But as the economy went into a free fall in the late 1970’s and unemployment grew more concerning, these high freight rates negatively affected the price of consumer goods, and a push by a growing number of independent trucking companies urged Congress to move the industry away from this strong regulation. The Motor Carrier Act signed into law by President Jimmy Carter in 1980 essentially deregulated the industry. While the industry today remains “unregulated” in control of rates and routes, trucking has become a highly regulated industry from the safety perspective. Hours of service and electronic logging devices were mandated for all interstate carriers in the past few years, and efforts to require side guard rails on trailers, speed limiters, and cameras are currently under discussion at the federal level. Many of these regulations have also been adopted at the state level, and policy discussions impacting the trucking industry occur during every legislative session in Oregon. Safety advocates, the environmental community, local governments, and bicycle and pedestrian advocates roam the halls in Salem, regularly pushing policy proposals that will impact our industry. Proposals just this year include motorcycle lane splitting, mandating renewable diesel, and controlling warehouse productivity, in addition to efforts to build a new I-5 Bridge and fund the update in the Rose Quarter section of I-5. All of these policy proposals keep OTA busy advocating for the trucking industry in Salem. And the issues keep growing. Many of these topics fall outside of traditional trucking industry concerns but they have the ability to positively or negatively affect your bottom line. Labor law concerns are growing with the advent of Paid While other industries are still trying to recover from the pandemic, trucking remains a leader in moving forward. Advocacy in Action
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