Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 4, 1994 TAG: 9402040185
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The testing program, the largest in the United States, will affect 6.6 million truck and bus drivers; 340,000 airline flight crew members and mechanics, air traffic controllers and aircraft dispatchers; 280,000 railroad and mass transit crew members and maintenance workers, and 120,000 pipeline workers. Maritime workers are already tested by the Coast Guard.
Transportation industry and employees' groups criticized the regulation, saying it imposed needless costs for relatively small benefits. The Air Line Pilots Association called the program "regulatory overkill."
Similarly, Walter J. Shea, president of the AFL-CIO's transportation trade department, called the regulation "overly intrusive and unconstitutional." Larry Mann, the union's lawyer, said he felt the regulation violated both the right to privacy and the right against self-incrimination, but acknowledged that the courts have found otherwise.
The new regulations were required by Congress after five people were killed in a 1991 New York subway derailment. A motorman who had been drinking, Robert E. Ray, was convicted of manslaughter in the accident and was sentenced to 5 to 15 years in prison. The Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska was partly attributed to drinking by the tanker's captain.
Transportation Secretary Federico Pena, who announced the breath-testing program, said the regulations would cost the transportation industry $200 million a year, but bring a $700 million annual benefit to society by preventing accidents that would otherwise occur. He said truck drivers who had been drinking were involved in 13,000 crashes a year.
"We are working," Pena said, "to ensure that when you board the subway, or a plane, a train or a bus, those responsible for your safety will have strong incentives to be sober and fit for duty."
by CNB