Log Book
12 Overdrive october 2008 Log Book The U.S. House of Representatives voted against extending the Mexican carrier program. The House voted 395-18 to prevent U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters from grant-ing authority to a Mexican car-rier to operate beyond the border zone unless expressly authorized by Congress. President Bush was expected to veto the bill because of NAFTA obli-gations. Rep. Pete DeFazio's bill, HR 6630, which blocked extension of the program, passed as amended Sept. 9. Information on how the Oregon Democrat's bill was amended was not immediately available. Voting in favor of the bill were 215 Democrats and 180 Republicans. It was opposed by 15 Republicans and three Democrats; 21 members did not vote. At press time, the Senate had not voted on it. On Aug. 4, John Hill, administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, announced he would continue the program two more years. The world is watching how we choose to honor our international commitments, Hill said. At a time of surging exports and growing demand by U.S. truck drivers for new opportunities, it is simply irrespon-sible for Congress to deny American drivers the opportunity to compete in Mexico and American shippers a more efficient and timely way of get-ting their goods south. The program has been a lightning rod for congressional criticism since it began a year ago. An amendment was passed in December to cut off fund-ing for the program, but bill backers and Peters disagreed on interpretation of the bill's wording, so the program continued. Bush has consistently backed the program, although he signed the omnibus funding bill in December that contained the amendment back-ers had expected to stop the program. Immediately before the vote on DeFazio's bill, the White House issued a statement that enactment of the bill would endanger the United States from meeting its North American Free Trade Agreement obligations. Program opponents argue that NAFTA's requirement for opening the border is contingent on Mexican trucks meeting standards equivalent to U.S. safety standards and background checks and charge that the DOT does not require Mexico to do so. Jill dunn House says no to border program Documentary focuses on truckers testing Lonestar international trucks, a division of navistar, partnered with director Brett morgen to produce a 45-minute documentary about three truckers' stories as they drove across the country in new international Lonestars. Drive and Deliver premiered aug. 22 in Dallas during the great ameri-can trucking show. attendees had the opportunity to meet the film stars and morgen, who has won awards as a producer and director of docu-mentaries on subjects ranging from boxing to african-american music. the Lonestar, mar-keted as a premium owner-operator trac-tor, is being shipped to dealers this month. Drive and Deliver is being released this month on DVD (avail-able via www.interna-tionaltrucks.com/shop) and a series of local screenings at various international dealer-ships. Visit www.inter-nationaltrucks.com for more information. NO DEAL between Navistar International Corp. and General Motors for Navistar to purchase GM's medium-duty truck busi-ness, say the companies. GM says it will continue to run the medium-duty busi-ness as it has in the past. A HIGHWAY ANGEL will be honored Dec. 30 during Roady's Humanitarian Bowl football game at Boise State University's Bronco Stadium in Boise, Idaho. The Highway Angel program is sponsored by the Truckload Carriers Association. CORRECTION: The name of Richard Anderson, the Waynesville, N.C.-based North American Van Lines owner-operator quoted in My Name Isn't Mud [September], was misspelled. We regret the error. KENWORTH TRUCK CO. received the highest ranking in customer satisfac-tion among Class 8 truck owners in the Over the Road and Vocational Segments, according to the new J.D. Power and Associates 2008 Heavy Duty Truck Customer Satisfaction Study. It is based on interviews with primary maintainers of the trucks. SHORT HAULS tim young is one of the stars of Drive and Deliver. the native alabamian pulls a tanker during the week and comes home to his three children and his wife, tisha, every weekend.