Mr. HUNGATE. I imagine that would be a very helpful thing. I am not sure quite how we could get that done. Perhaps through legislation or perhaps through regulation of that commission to state that after these issues, the burden of going forward and the burden of proof, I guess, originally is with the applicant.

But once he produces this, then the burden would shift to disprove that. I think it seemed like a very good suggestion.

And the time frame, now, the gentleman that just arose there, he said he was under a modified procedure. Does that mean it's supposed to be shorter than a regular one? And this is about 2 years and nothing has happened. I wonder to the extent, you know, is there any normal time?

If I came to you and told you I wanted to apply for a certificate and I wanted to know how long it was going to take me to get it, what do you think you would tell me?

Mr. RATLEDGE. Well, if our case in Amarillo is representative, those applications were first filed 2 years ago in June 1974. And you know. we are looking probably at least at another year.

Mr. HUNGATE. You are an attorney?

Mr. RATLEDGE. No, sir.

Mr. HUNGATE. Well, where do you get these refreshing ideas on the burden of proof. Well, I just wondered how long; 2 years and there is no answer. I am trying to get an answer or an idea. Maybe I should ask Mrs. Fitzgerald.

What would be-for someone in the legal field familiar with it, there is some time necessary. I mean, you have got to give people time to be heard and answered.

Mr. RATLEDGE. Maybe I should point out

Mr. HUNGATE. Pardon me, but let me follow this through. But what would you think would be a reasonable time here under usual circumstances, Ms. Fitzgerald?

Ms. FITZGERALD. Two to three years.

Mr. HUNGATE. Two to three years is what it takes?

Ms. FITZGERALD. Yes.

Mr. HUNGATE. Do you think it could be done in less time?

Ms. FITZGERALD. The wheels of government grind very slowly. I think it could be done, yes. But the Federal Government is just like the State agencies that they are so buried in paperwork with people shuffling paper most of the time.

Sure, anything could be shortcut if they wanted it to be.

Mr. HUNGATE. If we couldn't perhaps work out a shorter schedule and still give everyone the opportunity, you don't want to get sued today and have to answer tonight. You would like to have time to make a reasonable response.

But if we could speed this up and simply be shortening a case of 30 days to 20, maybe. This gentleman.

TESTIMONY OF RICHARD HOWE, TRANSPORTATION REGULATION BOARD IN IOWA

Mr. Howe. I am Richard Howe from the Transportation Regulation Board in Iowa. Our average disposition time last year on a new authority case has been about 3 to 5 months. We are convinced the ICC can speed up their process.

They are making some steps forward, but they have a tremendous distance to go. As far as your shifting the burden of proof, I haven't seen the final draft of the Motor Carrier Reform Act, but one of the earlier drafts I did review had that as a provision.

Mr. JENSEN. Ninety days or so; wasn't it?

Mr. Howe. There are many, many provisions in there. Some we feel are good, some not so good. But that is one we think is.

Mr. HUNGATE. And all the time your experience is what, 3 to 5 months?

Mr. Howe. Three to five months for new authority.

Mr. HUNGATE. So you would say they could cut 2 years down to 1 year without being unduly harmed, you would think?

Mr. HowE. We find that 90 days, 3 months, is really a minimum time for due process and notice. But when you get over 90 days, it should start to be able to perform.

Mr. HUNGATE. Thank you, sir. I am sorry, Mr. Ratledge. Anything further?

Mr. JENSEN. Mr. Chairman, let me just clarify that reading from the Motor Carrier Reform Act now before Congress. It states:

With respect to any application filed thereafter, the consideration of such application must be completed and a decision rendered within ninety days of the filing of such application.

Mr. HUNGATE. Or what happens?

Mr. JENSEN. I think it automatically goes into effect.

Mr. RATLEDGE. I might also add and I have a copy of the Motor Carrier Reform Act, too. There are many parts of which we are very, very supportive of. It would also embody that basic shift in the burden of new authority cases.

To using their summary here, will shift the focus of the entry proceedings away from the present concern to protect the existing carriers to providing the public better service.

Mr. HUNGATE. Mr. Bedell.

Mr. BEDELL. I would like to say something, particularly for my constituents who may be in the audience here. One of the difficulties I have had as a new Member of Congress is letting the people know the opportunities that we have as Congressmen to help them with these types of problems.

Now, if you have had an application in to the ICC or, I don't care, any other governmental agency, and you feel that they are not acting as they should on it, my plea to you is please contact our office and let us see if we cannot do something to get them to move.

You would really be surprised at what it means to some of those agencies to have a Congressman call over and say: "Look, I know somebody who applied eighteen months ago and hasn't had an answer. What is the reason for it?"

We won't usually be speaking to somebody down in the bureaucracy. We can usually speak to somebody at the top, and at least frequently, things start to happen when you do that.

People just feel they can't do anything about government, and that's what we are in there for-to help you with it. That's the only way that we can, I think, make the bureaucracy do something if you will

contact.

Certainly, my constituents, I urge you to contact me. We are not going to solve every problem the next day, but if you just sit back here quietly, nothing those bureaucrats like any better than a whole lot of people who are sitting back quietly, letting them sit there shuffling their papers.

[Applause.]

Mr.HUNGATE. I think, unless there is something further.

Mr. RATLEDGE. I was hoping you might ask about the unloading problem and maybe I can throw something in.

Mr. HUNGATE. Unload on it.

Mr. RATLEDGE. That's a rather complex issue. It's been before the ICC and courts for some time. As stated earlier by Mr. Hirschbach, it was recently remanded back to the ICC from the courts.

But the finding by the courts that, in fact, the unloading service had been historically considered a part of the basic service provided by the carrier and included in their line-haul rates for which they were, in fact, being compensated.

The problem arose when the carriers attempted to remove this unloading service without a corresponding reduction in the line-haul rates. Now, our basic position is that in fact it would probably be a desirable thing for the unloading responsibility to be shifted to the consignee on the unloading end.

It's difficult for us to control it as shippers. In fact, we couldn't very well give the truckline carte blanche to act as our agent and pay out any amount to unload for our account. Though I think it would be reasonable if that burden were shifted to the consignee to unload. However, there should be a corresponding reduction in the linehaul rate the carriers are since that service is, in fact, included in the line-haul rate currently.

Mr. HUNGATE. I see now better why that's part of the problem. Thank you. I am interested, if you're not a lawyer, what do you do? Mr. RATLEDGE. I suppose I am an economist by training.

Mr. HUNGATE. Well, you have been very helpful to the subcommittee. We do appreciate it. I thank all of those who testified here and offered their assistance this morning.

Mr. BEDELL. Mr. Chairman, there are some of us who are not lawyers and who do other things.

Mr. HUNGATE. I understand. I learn that all the time.

Mr. RATLEDGE. Sometimes it helps not being one.

Mr. HUNGATE. Well, I want you to know that while I'm a lawyer, I am not much of a lawyer. We have reached the time of the lunch break

now.

We will resume as near to 1 o'clock as possible. The first witnesses to be heard will be a panel of Mr. Bill Hayes of Chicago, Mr. Don Molder of Nebraska, and Mr. Andy Anderson of Detroit Lakes, Minn. Any other people who appear that wish to file a statement or wish to be heard here should please contact our counsel, Mr. Lynch, this gentleman here during the lunch hour.

With our thanks again to all of you, we will stand in recess until 1 o'clock.

[At this time a recess was taken.]

AFTERNOON SESSION

Mr. HUNGATE. The subcommittee will be in order. We call Mr. Bill Hayes, National Independent Truckers Unity Committee, Chicago, Ill.; Mr. Don Molder, Independent Truckers of Nebraska, Lincoln; and Mr. Andy Anderson, Midwest Independent Truckers Association, Detroit Lakes, Minn.

Mr. HAYES. Are you going to have all three of us there at the same time?

Mr. HUNGATE. Yes, that's right. If you will come forward, please, and be sworn.

Mr. Molder isn't here?

Mr. LYNCH. No.

Mr. HUNGATE. You gentlemen will be sworn first. Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Mr. HAYES. Yes.

Mr. ANDERSON. Yes.

Mr. HUNGATE. Please be seated. Mr. Anderson, would you state your name and address for the reporter and the subcommittee.

TESTIMONY OF ANDY ANDERSON, PRESIDENT, MIDWEST INDEPENDENT TRUCKERS ASSOCIATION; ACCOMPANIED BY WILLIAM T. HAYES, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL COUNCIL INDEPENDENT TRUCKERS

Mr. ANDERSON. Andy Anderson, president of the Midwest Independent Truckers Association, parts of Minnesota and South Dakota, finance chairman of the National Independent Truckers Unity Committee, owner-operator.

Mr. HUNGATE. Now, you're Mr. Hayes?

Mr. HAYES. Yes, sir.

Mr. HUNGATE. Please state your name and address for the record. Mr. HAYES. William T. Hayes, rural route 5, Lemont, Ill., president of the National Council Independent Truckers, Chicago chapter; alternate delegate to the National Independent Truckers Unity Committee.

Mr. HUNGATE. Thank you. And if Mr. Molder arrives, he will be seated here and sworn, too, counsel. This is a panel and the time allotment will be 20 minutes.

Now, Mr. Anderson, do you have a prepared statement?

Mr. ANDERSON. Yes.

Mr. HUNGATE. Without objection this will be made part of the record at this point. And Mr. Hayes, you have a prepared statement. Without objection it will be made part of the record at this point. Mr. Anderson, you may proceed.

Mr. ANDERSON. You have pretty well covered all the phases of operation here and where the problems lie. One thing that hasn't been covered-I own two trucks. I have them on the road.

One I have leased to a certificated carrier. The other one hauls totally exempt so I have got one in each field. I am not giving any individuals, companies, names will all be withheld. The figures I am

going to give you are an approximate of the way the standings are right now, the way things are being called.

The cost of operation of a truck, this is just for the tractor alone, is approximately $38,000. Well, your depreciation is about $5,000 a year, which costs you 5 cents a mile. Your fuel and oil run you about 13 cents, license about 1.2, insurance about 2 cents a mile.

Federal use is 210 of 1 cent. Your tires are 3 cents a mile and general repairs is 3 cents a mile. So the tractor is costing you 27.4 cents a mile before you pay your driver wages.

Now, take for instance, we will do a little rate comparison and consumer cost. You take a load of grain out of Beach, N. Dak., and they probably have 1,000 trucks going into the twin ports at Duluth and Superior at night. And maybe if there are 20 loads coming out that it would be what they could carry without having to have authority to carry something.

So you might say it's a one-way freight and go back empty. The round trip is 1,240 miles. Well this rate out of Beach, N. Dak., is 80 cents a hundred or 50 cents a bushel. At 73,000 pounds of gross weight, you got about 50,000 pounds payload, 800 bushels, 63-pound grain. This will bring you a gross of $400; $400 for 1,240 miles leaves you 32.3 cents a mile.

So if you take that away, you are running about-if you can get a driver for about 412 cents a mile, why you can break even. Now, take a load of cattle out of Billings, Mont., to Green Bay, Wis., which is a total round trip of 2,310 miles.

In a livestock trailer there isn't much you could load back unless you got livestock. So approximately $2.25 is what you will charge out of Billings to Green Bay, Wis. A 73,000-pound gross weight will give you 45,000 net less a 3,000-pound shrink gives you 42,000 pounds pay load.

It costs the consumer 21/4 cents a pound to haul this pound of beef from Billings, Mont., out on the range to a packinghouse in Green Bay, Wis. A trip out there would be approximately $945 for 2,310 miles. That figures out to 40.9 cents per mile.

Well, now, we get the weights and measures on this. This is where we run into a problem in these Minnesota Valley States, one of which we are in now. I live in one of them and got a couple of them on the other side of us.

If we could pressurize or get Federal assistance to help us, twice in the State of Minnesota we have submitted it 2 years right in a row and we have got it thrown back at us. This last one this year they said: "We will see you again in 1977." It's getting to be habit forming year

to year.

But this grain at 32.3 cents a mile for 73,000, if we can get that weight increased, that would give them a 57,000-pound payload, an additional 7,000 pounds, or $56 a load at 4.5 cents per mile, or it would bring them up to 36.8.

A load of cattle, based on those 73.000 I gave you before, would give a 48.500-pound payload at 80,000, or 6.3 cents per mile, and bring it up to 47.2 cents per mile.

Whereas, it would be no added increase to the consumer. That's one of the things that we're facing right now, too, is try to keep on a level