Federal Officials Propose Revisions to CMV Insurance Minimums, Crash Fault Data

Last week, the Motor Carrier Safety Advisory Committee (MCSAC) of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT) Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) met to discuss a host of issues, including revisions to the current commercial motor vehicle (CMV) insurance minimums and FMCSA’s Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) program. FMCSA is updating the mandatory minimum insurance levels trucking and bus companies are required to obtain each year for each individual vehicle. Larry Minor, FMCSA’s associate administrator for policy, said the current Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) that is being vetted by the White House Office of Management and Budget does not include or suggest any amounts over the current minimum of $750,000 for CMVs. He noted that the ANPRM, which will be published soon, will be asking for comment on whether the current minimum needs to change and, if so, to what and why. NRMCA is currently evaluating the impacts any such changes will have on the industry in preparation for a response to FMCSA.

Also announced at the MCSAC meeting by Bill Quade, FMCSA’s associate administrator for enforcement, was a report FMCSA plans to publish sometime after Thanksgiving that examines the possibility of including crash fault data into CSA scores. Currently, all reportable crashes, regardless of fault, are calculated into CSA scores, an issue NRMCA has publicly objected to since CSA’s inception.