By Mary Ann Bryant
Dec 1, 2004 - 11:49:00 PM
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As you recall, last summer the U.S. Court of Appeals said the FMCSA had failed to consider the effects of the new hours of service rule on the health of truck drivers like you. The court was concerned with the increase in driver time from 10 to 11 hours a day; retaining the sleeper-berth exception; not requiring electronic on-board recorders; and the 34-hour restart provision. Instead of appealing the decision, the FMCSA filed a motion with the court seeking to stay further action. This allows the agency time to address and to correct the concerns of the court about the new hours of service rule. The U.S. Court of Appeals hasn't ruled on the agency's motion as of this writing, so the agency is moving forward to address issues raised by the court. Already, the agency has entered into contracts with several entities for literature reviews pertaining to the effect of hours of service regulations on driver health.
Until then, the “Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2004” will hold the current rules in place. However, it does not change the U.S. Court of Appeals' opinion that the FMCSA has failed to consider the effects of the new rule on the health of truck drivers.
The checks are not in the mail
Did you get your original cancelled checks back from your bank last month? Probably not. As of October 28, 2004, a new law called “Check 21” changed how your cancelled checks are handled.
You'll no longer get the original cancelled checks back each month with your bank statement. You'll receive a photographic image of your checks. If you need your cancelled check to prove you've paid an electric bill or some other bill, you'll have to request something called a substitute check, a special copy of the original issued by your bank. The copy your received with your statement isn't considered a legal copy. The substitute check will be acceptable, but your bank may charge a fee for the substitute check.
Checks will clear faster, too. Because it's all done electronically, the check you wrote at the grocery this morning might clear your checking account before noon. That means the “float” or grace period some of us have become accustomed to is gone. You have to have money in your checking account to cover the check when you write it or you could end up with a bounced check.
Of course, you might think if the checks you write clear faster, then the checks you deposit into your account will also be credited to your account faster. The answer is no. Banks will still be able to hold local checks for up to two days and out of town check for up to five days.
If you need more information on how Check 21 will affect you, talk to your bank.
Keeping our roads safe
The Department of Homeland Security announced an additional $21 million grant for the American Trucking Association's (ATA) Highway Watch Program.
The agreement with the ATA will help to expand the Highway Watch Program, which trains highway professionals to identify and report safety and security concerns on our nation's roads. The program will provide training and communications infrastructure to prepare hundreds of thousands of transportation professionals to respond in the event they or their cargo are the target of a terrorist attack and to share valuable intelligence with Homeland Security if they detect potential threats.
Commercial truck and bus drivers, school bus drivers, highway maintenance crews, bridge and tunnel toll collectors and others will receive instruction under the Highway Watch program. The program's primary goal is to prevent attacks by teaching highway professionals to avoid becoming a target for terrorists who would use large vehicles or hazardous cargo as a weapon. A secondary goal is to train highway professionals to recognize and report suspicious activity. The grant will be available to the ATA in March of next year.
Hotbed of laughs?
Hard to believe! Which American city had the greatest guffaws or the choicest chuckles? Research commissioned by Shoebox, Hallmark's irreverent greeting card line, set out to find the hotbeds of humor in America. And coming in at Number one is Mankato, Minnesota. Really!What exactly promotes such jocularity among this small community of 31,477 is unknown, but something is making them laugh. Mankato, a college town in southern Minnesota, scored 76 out of 100 on Shoebox's “humor index,” putting the city 56 percent above the average score.
Whatever the case, the humor index measured cities' responses in three categories: sources of humor for people, such as television sitcoms, movies, comics; responses from individuals who think of themselves as “funny;” and sales of Shoebox greeting cards in the communities. A few of the findings were surprising.
Here must be something about cold weather that causes people from frosty locales to laugh more. Coming in second behind Mankato, was Helena, Montana, followed by Cheyenne, Wyoming, in third. Rounding out the top five were Providence, Rhode Island, and Milwaukee. Minneapolis-St. Paul was number six, followed by Colorado Springs, Boston, and Madison, Wisconsin. Completing the top 10 was Peoria, Illinois— which may help explain why comedians always want to know “how it will play in Peoria.”
The holiday season
You can find numerous versions of this next piece on the Internet, in magazines, and even in church sermons. It came to me a few years ago printed on a Christmas card. The author was listed as anonymous, but since then I've learned that several people and one magazine have received credit for it including Howard W. Hunter, Charles Swindoll, McCall magazine and others who have created their own version of this great poem.
This Christmas… Mend a quarrel. Seek out a forgotten friend. Dismiss suspicion, and replace it with trust. Write a love letter. Share some treasure. Give a soft answer. Manifest your loyalty in word and deed. Keep a promise. Find the time. Think first of someone else. Appreciate. Be kind; be gentle. Laugh a little. Laugh a little more. Express your gratitude. Go to church. Welcome a stranger. Gladden the heart of a child. Speak your love. Speak it again. Speak it once again. These are but inklings of a vast category; a mere scratching of the surface. They are simple things; you have heard them all before; but their influence has never been measured.
Christmas is celebration, and there is no celebration that compares with the realization of its true meaning—with the sudden stirrings of the heart that has extended itself toward the core of life. Then, only then, is it possible to grasp the significance of that first Christmas - to savor in the inward ear the wild, sweet music of the angel choir to envision the star-struck sky, and glimpse, behind the eyelids, the ray of light that fell across a darkened path and changed the world.