A freezing cold church full of law enforcement officers – now who would have thought that would be a party!
Well, it was … and BigRoad was honoured to be a part of the fun at the Ontario Police Commercial Vehicle Committee’s (OPCVC) autumn meeting in Barrie, Ontario last week. Close to 100 of Ontario’s finest commercial vehicle safety officers trekked north of Toronto to understand and learn more about electronic logs, their impact on hours of service legislation as well as get a gander at what vendor solutions they might possibly face during a commercial vehicle inspection.
Dedicated to truck safety across the province of Ontario, the Commercial Vehicle Safety teams’ responsibilities range from conducting commercial vehicle safety inspections, to addressing load security on commercial vehicles to enforcing the Dangerous Goods Transportation Act.
The critical safety services this team delivers is part of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) and is comprised of over 400 fully trained officers, supervisors and auditors from across the OPP and local/regional municipal police services. In addition, Ministry of Transportation (MTO) officers are also a critical part of this highly trained, commercial vehicle inspection squad.
Being just *down the street* a few hours, BigRoad headed north to attend and present at the invitation-only seminar. Commercial Vehicle Safety team representatives came from all corners of the province with officers coming from as far north of Thunder Bay and as far east as the Ottawa/Kingston/Cornwall corridor. Many officers came in uniform – carving out time from their busy schedules to ensure attendance at this educational session.
Constable Cory Kostyra, a core member of the OPCVC, and his colleagues pulled together an agenda that spoke to the key issues facing law enforcement. Kicking off the session with a rousing discussion on hours of service (HOS) legislation were two speakers from the CVSA and the Ministry of Transport (MTO).
Not surprisingly, the dialogue shifted very quickly to electronic logs and what constitutes a print request from an inspector – a common query we hear from both law enforcement and truckers alike.
What was crystal clear is that law enforcement wants to understand electronic logs within the context of sustaining the safety and security of all road travellers – and part of that safety effort is sustaining compliance to existing regulations. With our presentation on the BigRoad eLog and DashLink solutions, we witnessed first hand the thoughtful and insightful questions from the officers in attendance – caring just as much as truckers to understand the legislation and its nuances.
Inspecting officers want to understand what to look for in each vendor solution, how to find the key pieces of information they reviewed previously on paper logs, how electronic logs could be edited by the driver and, most importantly, how to remedy any tamper activity.
Inspectors at the roadside want to quickly usher on the drivers that are doing a great job; to let them be and continue on with their runs. Law enforcement want to focus their inspection time on those that aren’t doing a good job – the ones who are running hard, carelessly and at a safety risk to others on the roadways. They also want to audit those companies pushing their drivers beyond regulation hours of service. So, the best way for these officers is to learn about electronic logs, so they can help truckers and trucking companies who are running right.
BigRoad met some really amazing and passionate folks at this seminar. Officers who want to bridge the gap with the trucking community by learning more and more about the technologies that are becoming a major part of transportation industry regulation. Bridging that gap with officers taking the time and travelling a distance to learn more so they can be road-ready with these new electronic hours of service logging technologies.
Despite the cold November chill in the church auditorium, we bundled up and kept warm with great conversations with the wonderful people we met. A great surprise was meeting Waterloo Regional Police Staff Sgt. Mike Hinsperger, a chap local to our BigRoad offices who just happens to be the Provincial Chair for the OPCVC. And a high five goes to Constable Mark for keeping me on my toes during our Sec 78 subsection II a) coffee break confab ☺
Lastly, a great big thanks to Pat, Vito, Dal, Heather, Armando, Justin, Tara and the rest of the attendees for making our day so fantastic. Of course, a special shout out to Constable Cory for the invitation and great friendship – we can’t wait until the next seminar!
If your local or regional commercial vehicle inspection squad would like BigRoad to come and do a presentation on electronic logs and hours of service monitoring, just drop us a line and let us know when and where as we would love to help out.
Want to try out BigRoad for yourself? Get going on BigRoad for free!
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