LEGISLATIVE BULLETIN – March 16, 2005

FUEL SURCHARGES BILL ON THE FRONT BURNER:   HB 1370 will be taken up and probably acted on by the North Dakota Senate Transportation Committee on Thursday morning March 17.  The Committee meeting starts at 9:00 a.m. and there will be one bill before this.  Could be 9:15 when 1370 comes up, or it could get to be 10:00.  Anyone can attend.  The Chairman might reopen the hearing for further testimony, or he might not.  The presence of interested parties in the room is usually favorable.  The bill seeks to prohibit railroad fuel surcharges that are not based on the distance hauled.  The railroads now calculate them as a percentage of the rate.  Other language tying a surcharge limit to the actual increased cost of fuel is being discussed. 

Railroads have told the Committee that the state doesn’t have any jurisdiction because they, railroads, are governed by federal law.  Some of us think that might not be so ironclad as the railroads would like it to be.  If a state law is passed the railroads might challenge it and then the state could have a lawsuit on its hands.  This is being mulled over by the Committee, other legislators, and the Attorney General.  Most or all of these people are on our side regarding the excessiveness of fuel surcharges.  But whether the state can do anything about it, or if it should risk a court case, is not so clear. 

Your contact with members of the Senate Transportation Committee ASAP will help them appreciate the depth of the problem.  These gentlemen are our friends.   Their email addresses are as follows:

            Thomas Trenbeath, Chmn., Cavalier                           ttrenbeath@state.nd.us                
            Duane Espegard, V. Chmn., Grand Forks                 despegard@state.nd.us                
            Dennis Bercier, Belcourt                                           dbercier@state.nd.us       
            Duane Mutch, Larimore                                           dmutch@state.nd.us
            Dave Nething, Jamestown                                        (use fax 701-328-1997)
            John Warner, Ryder                                                 jwarner@state.nd.us

Stress the need for the state to take the strongest action possible to curtail these abuses. 

Your Association has received information from BNSF that it will be announcing a new mileage-based fuel surcharge program within the next couple of weeks.  There is no reason to abandon our legislative bill. We don’t know any details and there’s also the CP Rail.  Once the legislature goes home the leverage of a new state law is lost.