STB nominee pressed to be shipper’s advocate

STB nominee pressed to be shipper’s advocate

Elliott

   Daniel R. Elliott, President Obama’s nominee to become the chairman of the Surface Transportation Board, was pressed to be an advocate for shippers during a confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation on Wednesday.
   ‘It has been sort of a one-sided game in this person’s judgment,’ said Sen. John D. ‘Jay’ Rockefeller IV, chairman of the committee. ‘I’ve had a lot of concern with railroad shippers and this is something I have worked on for 24 consecutive years and made no progress whatsoever.
   ‘And I expect it all to change under you, sir,’ he added.
   Elliott said he understood ‘there are contentious issues between the shippers and railroads,’ and said he had ‘no preconceived notions of who is right and who is wrong’ and that he would ‘look at facts and law of each case and apply them in a just manner.’
   That promise of impartiality seemed more to trouble than placate Rockefeller.
   ‘The question about captive shippers and railroads — there are points that are right and there are points that are wrong,’ Rockefeller said. ‘Captive shippers throughout the land are being blackmailed, held-up, being threatened, being cutoff having their prices raised because there was only one rail going into that particular farm or steel mill or coal mine.
   ‘The Staggers Act said if there are two rails, then, let the free market set the price, but if there is one rail the STB sets the price. That has been roundly ignored by the railroads and inadequately addressed by captive shippers,’ he added. ‘I think that represents two clear two wrongs. The captive shippers don’t have enough money or they feel they are going to lose and they fear they are going to get drawn out because they are not big,’
   Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, told the nominee “we all want rails to have the capital and infrastructure to be safe and profitable. We also want shippers to have affordable options when they are captive and a forum that is as simple as possible for small shippers to come to the STB.”
   Hutchison also asked Elliott about a study of competition in the freight rail industry released last year by the economic consulting firm Christensen Associates, where it was found the STB provided some flawed data that overstated rail rates.
   The nominee said he understood there was already an ongoing process to provide corrected numbers and said he would ‘encourage the process. I would not want to rely on a flawed report.’
   ‘I hope that you will charge right into the middle of that hornet’s nest,’ Rockefeller said.