DataQs reform: FMCSA pivots to new state requirements for funding
Matt Cole
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on Tuesday published
responses to comments it received during a 2023 comment period
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implementation of a federal appeals process for Requests for Data Review
(RDRs) submitted to the agency through its DataQs system.
Additionally, as reported in part Friday, June 27, with the Department of
Transportation’s announcement of a raft of actions
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regulatory sphere, the agency is pivoting from that federal appeals system
to focus on the DataQs requirements for Motor Carrier Safety Assistance
Program (MCSAP) Grant funding.
The move comes in response to the comments filed, FMCSA said, many
recommending a more impartial review process than is currently the practice
in states. The agency “is proposing an approach to improve the fundamental
fairness” of the DataQs system by “implementing sufficient process
guardrails for States.”
If prior survey results are any indication, fundamental DataQs improvement
for timeliness and impartiality will be welcomed by many in trucking.
Overdrive readers earmarked DataQs process issues among several areas it
hoped the Trump administration and its DOGE effort could impact
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violations associated with court-adjudicated citations
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through DataQs may remain a problem, given local courts’ role in contesting
tickets.
As owner-operator Adam Mackey noted as part of prior reporting, “Fighting
tickets is now almost impossible” within the system. “Instead of having my
day in court, I have to submit multiple letters and get denied multiple
times until six to eight months later I finally might get my day in court.
Lawyers don’t understand it, and drivers don’t have the time or money to
jump through all the hoops.”
Nonetheless, the agency hoped the new changes it’s proposing will at least
“benefit users by ensuring appeals are reviewed in an independent,
impartial, uniform, and transparent manner, as well as providing timelines
for the initial request and appeals process.”
The agency’s previous idea first saw light in 2023
FMCSA’s 2023 notice proposed an appeal process for third-stage DataQs
reviews — or requests for change to a violation, crash or other information
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that have been rejected at least twice already, whether by state or federal
officials, with some limitations.
Currently, states are responsible for reviewing and resolving all “requests
for data review” (RDRs) within the DataQs system that pertain to the safety
data collected and reported in the Motor Carrier Management Information
System (MCMIS) by the state. The current system allows carriers to use the
DataQs system to request an RDR
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o-challenge-a-violation> within the FMCSA system and, if applicable, provide
supporting documentation.
Depending on the nature of the request, the review is routed to the
appropriate DataQs program office. That office can vary considerably — it
can be a state agency, an FMCSA field office, or FMCSA headquarters — yet
most DataQs reviews are assigned to the appropriate state agency for review,
since states are most often uploading carrier data to MCMIS.
After a decision is made on the initial review, that decision can be
appealed — known as an “RDR Reconsideration” — which could be routed to
the same program office as the initial review or follow a different process
in some instances, FMCSA noted, depending on the review type. (Some states,
like Minnesota
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reconsiderations/appeals to a dedicated review team with at least some
industry representation.)
In its 2023 notice, FMCSA proposed that DataQs users would be able to
initiate a request for an FMCSA appeal, but only after both the initial
review and the RDR Reconsideration reviews have been denied. The agency
collected 54 comments in response to that notice, 42 of which were specific
to the changes proposed, FMCSA said. The “majority of the comments were
balanced in tone and supportive of FMCSA’s proposal to develop and implement
a federal appeals process for RDRs.”
Many comments “provided suggestions on improving the proposed appeals
process and DataQs program more broadly,” the agency added. In its responses
published July 1, FMCSA split the comments into three categories:
* Calls to improve the impartiality of the RDR process
* Suggested approaches for the federal appeals process and the DataQs
program
* Requests to enhance the timeliness of RDRs
Challenge-process impartiality
Thirty commenters asked that FMCSA improve impartiality in processing RDRs.
Of those, 13 commenters — including the National Association of Small
Trucking Companies, Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, Trucker
Nation and others — took issue with RDRs being reviewed by the officer,
inspector, or agency that performed the inspection or issued the violation.
The National Tank Truck Carriers (NTTC) group pointed out that “there are
many times that an inspector refuses to make a correction despite evidence
that they made a mistake,” FMCSA noted, while NASTC and Trucker Nation
offered recommendations to improve impartiality. NASTC suggested FMCSA
require states to “establish adjudication by independent third parties and
to disallow involvement in adjudication by any state or local body or other
party with [an] actual or appearance of conflict of interest, such as review
by the issuing officer or his or her supervisor.”
Trucker Nation added that the “issuing officer [should] serve only as an
information source for the analyst/adjudicator who is assigned to the RDR”
to enhance the objectivity of the RDR process.
Regarding requests asking that the RDR be reviewed again after the initial
decision, several commenters recommended FMCSA’s proposed state guidelines
include a requirement that such “RDR Reconsiderations” be addressed by a
reviewer different from the initial reviewer.
Several voices called for a standard, nationwide process for RDRs. Some
commenters also claimed to have their DataQs reviews closed without
explanation, “which led to assumptions of bias in the review process,” FMCSA
said.
FMCSA’s response
After analyzing comments, as noted at the top, FMCSA determined that “its
initial proposal for a federal-level appeals process would not sufficiently
address the due process issues that currently exist with State-reviewed
RDRs.”
Instead, the agency now proposed to improve fairness with new state
requirements, including changes to the MCSAP Grant requirements that “would
provide necessary guardrails for the RDR process, accountability for States,
and empower States to take more complete ownership of their DataQs
programs.”
Eligible RDRs, other process recommendations
Ten commenters called for FMCSA to expand the scope of RDRs eligible for
the federal appeals process. The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance said “it
is [not] practical to go through the effort that will be involved in
establishing and maintaining this federal appeals process if it will not
address the majority of the RDRs that would be submitted.” Other commenters
offered specifics on what specifically should be eligible, and Trucker
Nation suggested that all violation types should be eligible.
The American Trucking Associations supported a more limited scope for the
federal appeals process that was proposed in the 2023 notice
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that allowing all RDRs could create a myriad of submissions that lead to an
ineffective independent review process.”
The agency acknowledged that the proposed appeals process “was narrow in
scope by only reviewing requests pertaining to interpretation of regulations
and policies, leaving many RDRs to be reviewed under processes that exist
today.” FMCSA is now proposing “defined processes at each stage of review
that will apply to all RDRs submitted for State-collected data in DataQs.”
Six commenters recommended using review panels in the federal appeals
process and suggested criteria for those panels. FMCSA agreed and proposed
for its MCSAP Grant requirements that states use a panel of subject matter
experts in the decision-making process for RDR Reconsideration and final
review requests.
Four commenters said FMCSA should share federal appeals decisions publicly,
and four also recommended that FMCSA remove all data related to an active
RDR from public websites until an outcome is decided. The agency noted that
because the new proposal is state-centered and doesn’t include centralized
federal review, decisions from RDRs would not be posted publicly on FMCSA’s
website, but would be available to the parties involved with the RDR.
FMCSA didn’t agree with the suggestion to remove all data related to
pending RDRs from public view. “Removing this data creates opportunities for
requestors to ‘improve’ their safety records in the short term by submitting
frivolous RDRs, which would impact the efficacy of the DataQs program and
other FMCSA safety programs,” FMCSA said.
Timeliness of the DataQs process
Ten stakeholders voiced concerns around timeliness of current DataQs
processes. Establishing deadlines generally would improve the effectiveness
of the RDR process, some said, and others suggested specific timelines.
OOIDA recommended all RDRs be decided within 60 days of the initial request,
the initial review and RDR Reconsideration be completed within 30 days, and
the federal appeal review then in consideration within 30 days.
ATA recommended FMCSA provide “an outline of the expected review-time once
the RDR is received at the federal level, the steps the agency is taking to
address the backlog of current RDRs, and how the program implementation will
be handled.”
FMCSA agreed that timeliness is important. Proposed DataQs requirements for
MCSAP funding include timeline standards for each stage of review. Proposed
standards would require states to “open, review, and communicate a decision
within 21 days of the requestor’s submission of an RDR and RDR
Reconsideration requests, and within 30 days of the requestor’s submission
for Final Review requests,” the agency said.
FMCSA’s proposal for MCSAP Grant funding
The agency’s new proposal here would revise DataQs requirements for MCSAP
funding states receive to “ensure proper due process for users of the DataQs
system,” FMCSA said. “These requirements aim to improve the impartiality,
timeliness, transparency, and fundamental fairness of the RDR process,
thereby strengthening FMCSA’s ability to make data-driven decisions that
inform resource allocation, policy changes, and new initiatives to prevent
large truck and motorcoach-involved crashes and enhance safety on the
nation’s roads.”
The agency noted that the requirements would only apply to DataQs requests
on state-owned data and would not apply to federally-owned data, such as
requests submitted to the Crash Preventability Determination Program
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, petitions submitted to the Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse Program, or
other FMCSA offices.
FMCSA’s proposal would require states to incorporate a multi-level review
process for RDRs, escalating the review from the DataQs analyst in the
state’s MCSAP Lead Agency to a responsible decision-maker or panel of
subject matter experts. Each RDR would be evaluated based on the
documentation and evidence provided by the submitter of the RDR, along with
any state documents or evidence.
“States would be encouraged to adopt a multi-level review process
appropriate for their agency(s) structure to support independent evaluation
of the request,” the agency said. “This multi-level review process would
benefit the ability for requestors to get a fair and thorough response with
assessment from multiple evaluators within a state.”
States would also be required to submit a DataQs Implementation Plan to
FMCSA that details how their agency will meet the requirements for each
stage of the RDR review process.
The proposed requirements for states’ RDR review process can be seen in the
Federal Register docket here
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visions-to-dataqs-
FMCSA is accepting comments on the proposed requirements for states,
including to specific questions mostly directed at states
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Comments can be filed here.
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The agency said following the comment period, a follow-up Federal Register
notice will respond to any comments received and announce the revised MCSAP
Grant requirements “with ample time prior to implementation.”
