By K C Pawling, Road Safety and Loss Prevention Specialist
A portion of my MSHA training this year was regarding Truck Safety and Operation. Like most of my trainings, this led to some great conversation regarding truck inspections and whether our county road departments are exempt from D.O.T. safety inspections. My first reaction was surely they are not exempt, but after discussion with a couple different county road departments that had the same belief, I thought this needed further investigation.
During my research, I contacted Lieutenant vonRentzell with the Carrier Enforcement Division of the Nebraska State Patrol. While Lieutenant vonRentzell agreed with me regarding the importance of pre- and post-trip inspections, he provided me the following:
Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSRs) 49 CFR Part 390.3(f)(2) provides an exemption for certain entities:
Part 390.3
(f) Exceptions. Unless otherwise specifically provided, the rules in this subchapter do not apply to—
(2) Transportation performed by the Federal government, a State, or any political subdivision of a State, or an agency established under a compact between States that has been approved by the Congress of the United States;
This is the part of the FMCSRs that covers the need to perform pre-trip and post-trip inspections. It is found in part 390 which is a subchapter of the 49 CFR and therefore inspection requirements do NOT apply to county government vehicles.
While we find that county governments are exempted from the Federal Motor Carriers Safety Regulations in the matter of inspections, this does not dismiss us from the responsibility of maintaining and operating safe vehicles in our county fleets. As governmental entities we should not need the oversight of another entity to keep the vehicles in our fleets in a safe operating condition. It should be an assumed part of our obligations as public officials.
Any driver of a commercial motor vehicle is expected to ensure that their vehicle is in a safe operating condition and maintain safe control of their vehicle while in operation. This responsibility includes notifying the owner of the vehicle of any deficiencies that are found prior or during the operation of the vehicle. If they are found operating an unsafe vehicle due to an obvious deficiency or due to an accident, the driver will be held accountable. The driver AND the county will likely be named in any suit that would be a result of any accident resulting from a deficient vehicle. The court cases found while researching this topic commonly cited the safety inspection reports of the vehicles involved in accidents, so expect the same for any litigation you are involved in.
In closing, I would like to finish with this. Even though the county is exempt of inspections I would recommend that you would treat your trucks as though they were not exempt. Have your trucks annually inspected and require your operators to do pre- and post-trip inspections. Make any necessary repairs to the trucks to avoid the litigation process that is sure to follow an accident. It will also save you and your operators some sleepless nights if an injury or heaven forbid, a fatality should occur.
This is just scratching the surface of this topic. If you would like to have further conversation regarding this topic, I can be found at [email protected] or 402-310-4417.
