Top Democrats suggested they're open to Gov. Maura Healey's legislative push to minimize upheaval for hundreds of commercial drivers, in the process lamenting a "bipartisan failure" that contributed to the need for action so late in the lawmaking term.
With only five weeks remaining in the 2024-2025 term, the Transportation Committee dove in Tuesday on a bill Healey filed five days ago (H 5109) that aims to prevent many bus and truck drivers from losing their commercial driving eligibility based on offenses that are 19 or more years old.
The panel convened a rare even-year November public hearing, where a handful of small business owners described the strain their employees have experienced since the Registry of Motor Vehicles suddenly notified them in the summer they were no longer eligible for commercial licenses.
Sean Bishop, owner of Ground Effects Landscaping in Carver, called the RMV's summertime move — which administration officials are working to alter — "completely unconscionable."
Bishop and his wife, Leanne, said one of their employees has been so disrupted by the suspension notice based on driving offenses from more than 30 years ago that he was hospitalized due to stress.
"This is literally a life and death situation for some of these families that don't have a way to make their living because of this rule," Bishop told lawmakers.
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Massachusetts law deems motorists ineligible for commercial licenses if they have been convicted at any point in their driving history of two or more major offenses, such as operating under the influence.
The state's effectively unlimited lookback period differs from federal law, which exempts offenses committed in passenger vehicles that occurred before Sept. 30, 2005 and allows drivers to seek reinstatement of their commercial privileges after 10 years of disqualification.
In August, the RMV notified nearly 500 drivers that their licenses would be downgraded from commercial to passenger due to past offenses. Many of the affected motorists have been driving commercially for years and were blindsided by the apparent shift in enforcement.
The move prompted public outcry, and the RMV gave CDL holders facing disqualification several months to request a hearing.
It's not entirely clear why the RMV suddenly moved this summer to suspend drivers based on old offenses. Transportation Committee co-chair Sen. Brendan Crighton said at Tuesday's hearing the action was the result of an "audit" into driving records, not a new law or regulation taking effect.
His counterpart, Rep. William Straus, said state law already allows the RMV to create a reinstatement program after 10 years, even while voicing support for Healey's proposal.
"Many states do this. [The law] goes back to the 1990s, so for 30 years, there's been a statute on the books that has authorized the Registry to provide that 10-year [reinstatement] period," Straus told Bishop during the hearing. "Had the Registry somewhere over the course of 30 years — so it's kind of been a bipartisan failure, if you will — adopted that kind of regulation, your employee wouldn't have faced this situation. So the statute's been fine."
Healey took action on two parallel tracks last week: she instructed the RMV to create a reinstatement program that complies with federal law, and she filed a bill that would prevent offenses that occurred before Sept. 30, 2005 from counting against commercial eligibility, mirroring the federal timeline.
More RMV news
A Department of Transportation official previously estimated the legislative change would help about two-thirds of the drivers who received letters over the summer.
The RMV gave CDL holders until Jan. 2, 2025 to request a hearing, and drivers will then have until March 3, 2025 to appeal any decision to the Division of Insurance's Board of Appeals.
Straus, a Mattapoisett Democrat, called the governor's legislation "a significant correction."
"Both have to, I hope, take place: a statutory change to bring us in line with federal law, and this regulation," he said. "As a policy matter, I happen to agree with the governor's decision in proposing this."
No one from the RMV or the Healey administration spoke at Tuesday's hearing before the Transportation Committee. Straus said at the outset he believed the two-page letter Healey filed and the one-paragraph bill "pretty clearly indicate the governor's and MassDOT's position and the Registry's position on this."
The agency drew sharp criticism from the few business owners in attendance who employ commercial drivers affected by the notices. Describing the interplay between the RMV and Beacon Hill, Bishop said, "One hand doesn't know what the other hand's doing."
Republican Rep. Steven Howitt of Seekonk, himself a licensed commercial driver, compared the suspension notices and subsequent response to the RMV's summertime decision to stop registering miniature vehicles known as kei cars, which officials reversed in the face of blowback.
"I question what's going on within the Registry. What has caused this all-of-a-sudden lookback?" Howitt said.
Independent Rep. Susannah Whipps of Athol urged her colleagues to move quickly, warning that if the Legislature does not take action on the bill before the term ends Dec. 31, Healey would need to restart the legislative process from the beginning in January.
"We know if this doesn't pass by Dec. 31 at midnight, by the time new committees are created and chairs [are named] in the legislative process, we won't be hearing this again until maybe March," Whipps said. "I think it's incumbent upon all of us legislators to get this through as quickly as possible."
In an interview after the hearing, Crighton said top Democrats moved to schedule the hearing "as quickly as possible" after Healey filed the bill last week.
"It's pretty straightforward," he said of the bill. "I think the committee will do its due diligence, but can do so in an expedited way. Obviously, we are in a bit of a time crunch ... We certainly are going to deliberate as a committee with the hopes of getting it in place so action could potentially occur before the end of this session. But it is a tight timeline."
