WASHINGTON — House lawmakers have approved legislation directing the U.S. Postal Service to set new rules for keeping track of crashes involving its trucking contractors, including penalties against motor carriers for failing to report them.
On Monday the House passed, by voice vote, the Mail Traffic Deaths Reporting Act of 2024, which would require contract carriers and Postal Service employees to report to the agency roadway crashes involving vehicles carrying mail and resulting in injury or death no later that three days after the crash.
It also would require the Postal Service to maintain an internal database of such reports and publish an annual summary of information related to the reports.
The legislation, introduced in March by Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., is in response to investigations of the Postal Service’s safety records involving its long-haul contract carriers and a government watchdog report published in February revealing lax oversight of its partner trucking companies, brokers and drivers.
“It is our hope this legislation creates a virtuous feedback loop at the Postal Service in which crash data enforces strict adherence to safety compliance and best practices,” Connolly said when he introduced the bill.
In a March 12 op-ed published in The Hill, Connolly detailed a tragedy that occurred in June 2022 involving two families driving on Interstate 25 between Greeley, Colorado, and Gillette Wyoming, and a truck carrying mail on a contract with the Postal Service.
“The truck’s brakes were out of alignment, it was uninsured, and its driver did not have a commercial driver’s license,” Connolly said. “The truck slammed into the back of the Godines’ family vehicle and, in an instant, a member of the Everts family and three generations of Godines lost their lives, including a 3-month-old baby girl.
“Unknown to most Americans, this tragedy is playing out across our country. Over the last three years, at least 79 people were killed in crashes involving trucks contracted by the Postal Service. Even more concerning, the number of lives lost could be even higher because, just last year, we learned that USPS did not even report serious crashes involving its trucking contractors.”
Reports submitted by contract carriers and Postal Service employees must include detailed information “describing, at a minimum, the crash, including the date, time, location, nature of the crash, information identifying the contractor, number of injuries, fatalities, and any contributing factors to the crash,” according to the bill. “An employee or contractor … shall update the report, in such form and manner as the Postal Service deems appropriate, to reflect any change in crash-caused injuries or fatalities.”
Postal Service contractors that fail to report a crash within the reporting deadline face penalties to be determined by the Postal Service, “including fines, suspension of contracts, or termination of contracts,” the legislation states.
“The Postal Service may take into account the severity of the applicable traffic crash and the frequency of noncompliance with the requirements of this Act by the applicable Postal Service contractor when determining which penalty to apply (if any).”
The bill, which now goes to the Senate, has a 34% chance of being enacted, according to govtrack.us, which analyzes legislation trends. Only about 21% of bills that made it past committee in 2021-2023 were enacted, the website noted.