NIT League clears air about clean air

NIT League clears air about clean air    The National Industrial Transportation League countered charges from environmental groups that its support for clean air programs at ports in Los Angeles and Long Beach was “disingenuous,” calling the comments “a flagrant distortion of the truth.”
   In a letter to Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Transportation and Infrastructure, the nation’s leading advocate for shippers said its support for improved air quality has been demonstrated through many of its members' “substantial investments in new and cleaner trucks.”
   The NIT League was responding to comments in a Aug. 21 letter that the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Sierra Club made in a letter to Oberstar, in which they promoted an amendment of the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA) to broaden the ability of local governmental entities, such as port authorities, to regulate the port drayage industry.
   The NIT League is one of a coalition of 32 organizations that wrote to Oberstar in July opposing amendment of the FAAAA, which is being supported by ports such as New York and Los Angeles.
   Local port regulation would “create a chaotic patchwork of local regulations that would make efficient and effective interstate transport impossible,” the league said, adding its opposition to a part of the Port of Los Angeles clean truck plan was “narrowly confined to the manner in which the ports sought to achieve those goals, namely, through a concession program that imposed burdensome economic regulations on trucking companies that pick up and deliver import and export cargo.
   “Even more troubling was the anticompetitive proposal of the Port of Los Angeles which banned small independent truck drivers from serving its port,” said the NIT League. “We have consistently opposed the Los Angeles port’s requirement that all drivers be employees of trucking establishments rather than independent owner-operators. It was and remains our position that restricting port access to employee drivers would not benefit the environment. This mandate would only result in significant restrictions on cargo flows and would drive hard working independent owner-operators to the unemployment lines.”
   If port truckers are employees rather than independent owner-operators, it’s argued they would be organized by the Teamsters union and that higher wages and restrictive work rules would cause port drayage costs to climb.
   Groups like the NRDC and Sierra Club believe large trucking companies will be easier to regulate, will be able to better maintain trucks and create a more efficient industry by being able to match inbound and outbound deliveries that can be hauled in a single round-trip.