By Patrick Coyle, Staff Writer

On October 2nd, 2008 the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) issued a notice of proposed rule making requesting comments on proposed rules to implement new inspection, investigation and enforcement authorities conferred on the Secretary of Transportation by the Hazardous Materials Transportation Safety and Security Reauthorization Act of 2005 (HMTSSRA). The Docket (PHMSA-2005-22356) was opened for public comments until December 1, 2008.

The heart of the enhanced enforcement authority that Congress provided to the Department of Transportation was the authority to open packages suspected of containing undeclared hazardous materials. Most people in the shipping community acknowledge the potential dangers associated with undeclared hazmat shipments. The 52 commentors to this rule, however, expressed a variety of concerns about how PHMSA wrote the rules to implement this authority. Those concerns ranged from employee safety, to corporate liability, to the continued existence of their businesses under the proposed rules.

Common Themes
In view of the large number of comments PHMSA received, it is not practical to examine each comment and recommendation.  There are, however, common themes in many of the submissions. By examining these themes we can quickly learn of the concerns that the regulated community has with these proposed rules.
Retail Ship Centers

Before looking at the concerns of the hazmat community we can first separate out the comments of a group that has little in common with that community, the Retail Ship Centers. These retail establishments and their representative organization have, by intention, nothing to do with hazardous material shipments. They act as drop-off points for small, occasional shippers, who leave their packages for carriers such as UPS® or FedEx®. These facilities do not accept declared hazardous materials and have no way of knowing if their customers are submitting an undeclared hazmat shipment.