A plan that would require truck drivers with hazmat endorsements on their commercial drivers licenses to submit to background checks, including fingerprinting, is meeting with strong resistance from industry groups and the state agencies that have been told to implement it. National Tank Truck Carriers Inc. (NTTC) and other groups, including several state departments of motor vehicles (DMVs), argue that the Nov. 3 start date mandated by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is unrealistic.

"The proposal says forthrightly that the fingerprinting will be done 'in a form and manner as prescribed by TSA,'" says NTTC president Clifford Harvison. "But TSA hasn't made public what that form and manner is. … Will it be ink and paper? Electronic? If so, what format? The states don't know any of that, and until they do, they can't prepare for it."

The TSA has responded that it will rely in part on the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) to implement the plan. But in comments to the public docket, AAMVA president Linda Lewis said: "If it is the intention of TSA to require state motor vehicle agencies to take fingerprints, almost all [have neither] the capability nor the funds to assume that responsibility." She also noted that the TSA has yet to inform her group of its requirements.

Harvison is quick to point out that his concern with the regulations is the vagueness of the plan and the lack of adequate preparation time. "We have no problem with the basic concept," he says. "As a matter of fact, we think that eventually criminal background checks, fingerprint-based or otherwise, should be expanded to the entire trucking industry. But I think that November 2004 is a more realistic deadline."