 |
|
|
 News from Around the Americas | September 2007 
Crackdown Intensifying on US Truckers Who Can't Speak English
 The Trucker
go to original
| | A U.S. Border Patrol agent monitors heavy trucks with a canine at a border crossing in Laredo, Texas. (Ricardo Segovia/Reuters) |
Harlingen, Texas — Interstate truck and bus drivers across America may find themselves pulled off the highway if state troopers or vehicle inspectors find they can't speak English.
The requirement has been on the books for decades, but enforcement has begun before Mexican trucks are allowed in the U.S. interior as of Sept. 6.
"We have found people in violation of this for a number of years and we're working feverishly to correct it," said John Hill, head of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
Since 1971, federal law has said that commercial drivers must read and speak English "sufficiently to understand highway traffic signs and signals and directions given in English and to respond to official inquiries."
Hill said the language deficiency was found mostly in the commercial zone that varies from 25 miles to 75 miles north of the Mexican border, but since inspectors there are bilingual and Mexican truckers are not allowed past that zone, it hasn't been an issue.
But after more than a decade of legal wrangling, U.S. highways are opening up.
The North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994 called for Mexican and U.S. trucks to travel freely throughout one another's nations, but the provision was stalled by labor unions and environmental groups' arguments that the trucks are unsafe.
A pilot program allowing a limited number of already approved Mexican trucks to pass the border zone is now set to take effect Thursday.
On Friday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request made by the Teamsters union, the Sierra Club and the nonprofit Public Citizen to halt the program. The appeals court ruled the groups have not satisfied the legal requirements to immediately stop what the government is calling a "demonstration project," but can continue to argue their case.
The government contends that further delays in the project will strain the relationship between the U.S. and Mexico.
Mexican truckers, meanwhile, said they were prepared to leave merchandise in Mexican warehouses if U.S. authorities insisted on fines for not knowing English in the border zone.
"We have been talking with U.S. authorities," said Luis Moreno Sesma, president of Mexico's national chamber of cargo haulers. "The law says that the operators should know English to cross the border, but we have said they should have special consideration for the border guys."
The language requirement is part of a long checklist — including criminal background and drug and alcohol tests — that carriers must pass to go into the interior. Also required are complete vehicle safety and emissions inspections.
U.S. commercial drivers going into the Mexican interior, part of the reciprocal agreement, will have to speak Spanish.
Under the new enforcement regulations, drivers who can't speak English in the commercial zone may be ticketed and fined. Those beyond the border zone will also be pulled off the road.
Richard Henderson, director of government affairs for the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, a nonprofit group representing federal and state highway inspectors and highway patrols, said the requirement was a "no brainer."
"The bottom line is safety," Henderson said. "Obviously, if (the driver) can't speak English he's not going to know what some of the regulations are."
José Rocha Rodríguez was one of the first drivers to be sanctioned for not knowing English. He said he wasn't fined but given a notice saying he could not pass the border zone.
"They talk to you now in English and they've never done that before," he said.
Jose Mendoza, a 25-year-old driver in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, said that it seemed the United State authorities were always coming up with new ways to stop Mexican trucks from traveling beyond the border.
He said the drivers felt discriminated against, and that U.S. officials were looking for any pretext to fine them.
"They are giving us all kinds of fines. Last week, for a headlight that I could change myself, they charged $150. And this after they saw that I was changing it," Mendoza said.
Rigoberto Castañeda, who has been driving for 17 years, agreed that the biggest obstacle the truckers faced was discrimination.
So did Primitivo Gonzalez, owner of a small trucking company.
"The rules they are using right now are very strict," he said. |
| |
|
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us