Our industry has some great news to celebrate; maybe it will take our mind off the drought for a few minutes.  After significant efforts over the past three years, the US Congress passed a highway transportation bill that includes language clarifying the agricultural Hours of Service exception for the delivery of farm supplies and commodities. 
 

FMCSA just confirmed with The Fertilizer Institute that they will issue a rulemaking shortly in the Federal Register updating the current regulations to reflect the changes.  The new HOS exception will go into effect on October 1, 2012.  

The exception now applies to all farm supplies, including all forms of fertilizer, seed and agrichemicals from the distribution point (terminal or warehouse) and the retail site, within a 150 air mile radius (used to be 100 air miles). For commodities, the 150 mile radius is from the source of the commodity to the delivery location. 
 

For intrastate movements, IFCA worked successfully with IDOT and the Illinois General Assembly back in 2006 to mirror the federal HOS exemption so that deliveries within the state lines could utilize the exception as well.  But in 2009 USDOT decided that "distribution point" did not include terminals or warehouses, and we had to fight for a special waiver to obtain relief from HOS, and we could get that only for anhydrous ammonia.  The ammonia waiver is set to expire October 2012.  With the new change, the Illinois exemption will also go back into place and once again include all distribution points and all farm supplies.  The HOS exemption is good during the planting and harvesting seasons as defined by each state.  In Illinois, IFCA worked with IDOT years ago to establish January 1 - Dec 31 as our planting and harvesting season (year-round). 

 

IMPORTANT NOTE:  For intrastate movements in Illinois, for now we remain at 100 air miles between distribution points which is reflected in our Illinois regulations.  IFCA has already met with IDOT to begin the process of  updating the Illinois regulations to make it 150 air mile radius.  Rulemaking can take 6-8 months, so our goal is to have the 150 air mile radius in place before Spring 2013.  We appreciate the cooperative working relationship we have with the staff at IDOT and applaud their efforts to begin the rulemaking process on behalf of the agribusiness industry. 

 

On the IFCA website http://www.ifca.com, we have posted the federal language that was included in the highway transportation bill.  We have also posted a document that highlights the key elements in the current Illinois transportation regulations pertaining to the agricultural hours of service exception.  It is always good to keep these documents handy in case you need to clarify the provisions with law enforcement. 
 

The resolution to the HOS issue is a major accomplishment.  It has taken many years of  negotiations, written comments, testimony, visits to Washington D.C. and outreach with our Congressional delegation to assure passage of this bill.  Illinois had many Congressman who co-sponsored legislation to make this happen, including Congressmen Jerry Costello, Tim Johnson, Aaron Schock, Bobby Schilling, John Shimkus, Randy Hultgren, Don Manzullo, Adam Kinzinger and Joe Walsh.  Senators Mark Kirk and Richard Durbin were also supportive as was Secretary Ray LaHood and FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro.  There were many meetings on this subject and it took a collective effort involving state associations like IFCA, members who wrote letters and made phone calls, and our national organizations TFI, ARA, NCFC and Ag Transporters to do the daily footwork on Capitol Hill. 

 

We should all take a moment to appreciate what we have accomplished and the certainty we once again have regarding HOS.  If you have questions please contact IFCA and we will keep you posted on our state rulemaking efforts to expand the radius to 150 air miles.