OOIDA not alone in minimum insurance fight
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association has been taking every possible step to fight against any attempts to increase truckers’ minimum liability insurance requirements. Even better, OOIDA is not alone in the fight.
About 60 organizations have joined OOIDA in a coalition aimed at ending efforts to increase the minimum insurance requirement for motor carriers. In addition to trucking, the coalition is represented by organizations from the agriculture, manufacturing, materials and towing industries.
Last year’s version of the highway bill proposed to increase motor carriers’ minimum requirement from $750,000 to $2 million. The OOIDA-led coalition is working to keep any increase out of the next highway bill.
In May, the coalition sent letters to the U.S. House of Representatives’ Blue Dog Coalition and Problem Solvers Caucus in hopes of swaying enough votes to block any such measure.
“An increase in insurance requirements is wholly unnecessary, would do nothing to improve highway safety, and would have a severe negative impact on our members by significantly increasing their operational costs,” the coalition wrote.
In addition to OOIDA’s coalition efforts, the cause found a powerful ally in the construction industry.
The Transportation Construction Coalition, which includes 33 national associations and construction unions representing hundreds of thousands of individuals, made its opposition to an increase known in an April letter to the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
“We knew all along that opposition to this unnecessary, controversial and harmful proposal would continue to grow,” said Collin Long, OOIDA’s director of government affairs. “The support of an organization like TCC is huge in our efforts to prevent an increase. We hope the committee begins to realize just how destructive this proposal would be to countless American industries and small businesses as more begin to voice their opposition.” LL