CDL Myth

CDL Myth. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

My first job may years ago was working on a farm and part of that responsibility was to drive a large wheat truck. I barely had my learners permit and never even considered having a commercial drivers license or CDL. From the orchard to the wheat fields requiring farm workers to have a CDL to drive certain vehicles would put a major crimp in ag operations. Or so the story goes. John Porcari is Deputy Secretary of Transportation. He says all of the talk about these regulations is simply hearsay.??PORCARI: It is just a rumor. That is just not happening. We have no plans to do anything like that. What we’re actually doing is a listening tour where we are listening to leaders in the agricultural community about what their issues are, how transportation can help them. There’s a very strong link between transportation and agriculture and we want to build o that. We have no plans to have a commercial drivers license requirement. It’s kind of a legend. It started somewhere; we’re not quite sure where. What we are interested in is having a safe transportation system but we are not going to burden agriculture community with unnecessary regulations.??Still - some lawmakers worry that the department is prepping to tighten the rules and impose new regulations on farmers who drive agricultural transport equipment. The aforementioned CDL regulation - if sought - would require a written test and the potential for drug and alcohol testing.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.