This week on the Oakley Podcast, it’s Driver Appreciation Week as host Jeremy Kellett chats with Shannon Newton, the President of Arkansas Trucking Association. During the episode, Shannon and Jeremy discuss the importance of recognizing truck drivers’ contributions and share initiatives like providing free lunches to drivers. The conversation addresses significant industry challenges, including freight fraud, cargo theft, and the complexities of hair testing for drug screening. Shannon also highlights the need for better communication and collaboration among carriers and law enforcement, a call to action for industry unity, continued support for truck drivers, and so much more.
Key topics in today’s conversation include:
- Celebrating Driver Appreciation Week (1:06)
- Welcoming Back Shannon Newton to the Podcast (1:58)
- Importance of Local Elections (5:24)
- Driver Appreciation Efforts (7:01)
- Challenges Faced by Truck Drivers (8:41)
- Freight Fraud and Cargo Theft Issues (9:30)
- The sophistication of Cargo Theft (12:14)
- Hair Testing for Drug Screening (14:34)
- Concerns About Loopholes in Testing (18:32)
- $462 Million Verdict Discussion (22:00)
- Impact of Nuclear Verdicts on Industry Costs (25:19)
- Project Zero and Adoption Awareness (26:20)
- Benefits of the Arkansas Trucking Association (28:56)
- Networking in the Trucking Industry (31:21)
- Final Thoughts and Takeaways (32:32)
Oakley Trucking is a family-owned and operated trucking company headquartered in North Little Rock, Arkansas. For more information, check out our show website: podcast.bruceoakley.com.
Transcription
Jeremy Kellett 00:12
Welcome to the Oakley podcast, trucking, business and family. This show is brought to you by Oakley trucking, headquartered in North Little Rock, Arkansas. The purpose of this podcast is to communicate with Oakley owner operators and their families by giving them up to date information concerning Oakley trucking and the trucking industry, from business advice to safety updates to success stories, also to give an insight to outside truck drivers that might be interested in joining the Oakley family. Hey, welcome to the Oakley podcast, trucking, business and family. I’m Jeremy kellett, Director recruiting here at Oakley trucking, and I’m your host for this podcast. We are bringing this one to you from the North Little Rock studio, the place that we love so much, that is so nice. And here we made a few changes over the past. I was just talking to my new guest that y’all are gonna hear here in a second, but she said, it’s always changed. Every time I come in here, you get a new setup? I said, Well, you know, special guests, we made a new special setup. So on this episode of the podcast, this week, we’re going to talk about one. One of the main things is driver appreciation week. That’s what it is. This is coming out on Wednesday of driver appreciation week. It’s truck driver appreciation week all over the country, nationwide, and you need to take time to thank a truck driver. I went into my local eight mile store this morning to get me a little bit of breakfast, and as soon as I walked in there, they saw signs hanging from the ceiling that said, hey, if you got milk, thank a truck driver. If you got groceries. Think of a truck driver. If you got clothes, think of a truck driver. And they had all these signs hanging from the ceiling, and then all the people working there had T -shirts on. We love truck drivers. So I just thought that was a great way to start out the week. And I kind of felt what I was telling the guys about in the meeting this morning, I was kind of, we’re getting out done by the eight mile store, you know. So anyway, a good way to start it off, but with me today to celebrate it, is Shannon Newton. She is a president of the Arkansas Trucking Association, and we’re going to talk to her about a couple of different things, along with driver appreciation week, but just some things that I think you listeners need to hear coming from the woman in charge. And I think it’s a lot of stuff that I don’t realize that’s going on all the time, and how hard the Arkansas Trucking Association is fighting for truck drivers and trucking companies. And I think it’s just good but we’re going to talk, we got a little bit of talk about hair testing. Might briefly touch on that $462 million verdict that came out last week on Wabash national freight fraud and cargo theft is a big thing going on right now that I think we want to discuss a little bit more. So few things like that. We want to get started. But first I want to know, man, you guys, you listeners out there, have done a fantastic job. In October of 2023 we had 23,000 subscribers on YouTube. Now, today, we’ve got 45,000 subscribers on YouTube. I’m like, where do these people come from? But that’s fantastic. That tells me that y’all are sharing it, you’re telling people about it. And, I mean, that’s, that’s what we want to hear. I mean, that’s what we want to do. We want to reach every truck driver we possibly can. Because, I mean, as I always say, this thing has turned into really good information that we want owner operators and truck drivers to be successful. We want to give you information any way we can for you to be successful out there on the road. A used
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Jeremy Kellett 04:21
All right, enough said. Let’s get straight to it, Shannon, what’s going on?
Shannon Newton 04:24
Good morning. Thank you for having me. I’m happy to be here on truck driver appreciation week. Yeah,
Jeremy Kellett 04:29
I appreciate you coming out in the rain this morning. Yeah, it’s part of the process. Happy to be here. Good. What’s going on with Shannon? Nuke, Oh, wow. Well,
Shannon Newton 04:39
It’s a busy season. I guess, just like probably most of your listeners were talking, you know, back to school and back to routines and all of the various commitments that are keeping us busy, at home, at work, we’re heading into an election season. So that’s a very important time of year for people who are in public relations and government relations like I am, like I have about. About 24 fundraisers this week for local legislative candidates. Yeah, it’s legislative council week, which means they’re all in Little Rock for this one week of the month. And so that’s the week that they choose to host all of their fundraisers. And so I’ll be interacting with lots of state legislators this week looking forward to the session coming up in January.
Jeremy Kellett 05:18
Oh, yeah, I guess that there will be an election in 2024 that creates a lot of stuff for you. It does
Shannon Newton 05:24
both at the federal level and the state level. I think, you know, probably your listeners are, you know, the federal presidential race, obviously, and congressional races and for DC, get a lot of in the news cycle. But the local races actually are where we have the opportunity to, you know, change the it’s a lot more close to hand to hand combat, I guess, at a state level. And so there are some opportunities there. You know, look back at the issues that we talked about two years ago. We’re talking about, you know, towing policies to reform policies, some insurance issues, and so those types of things we actually address at the site level. And so working with legislators already about those opportunities in January.
Jeremy Kellett 06:00
Yes, you can. That’s more if you can see some progress, right, made than federal level. I mean, you can actually see some results.
Shannon Newton 06:06
They move things faster the closer you get to the people. And so the state legislature, yes, actually does move a lot faster than federal
Jeremy Kellett 06:14
does. It feels good to see some positive things. You know that, I know it may take years, but you see some results, some good stuff happening. For for trucking,
Shannon Newton 06:22
For people like me who like to play the game. Like to win. I want to know what the score is, and I want you to know, but moving the ball and actually seeing things happen. So the state legislature does give us that opportunity to make our case on those particular issues. And like you said, enact change in a relatively short amount
Jeremy Kellett 06:39
of time. Yeah, because a lot of those are very important. You just mentioned the towing. I mean, the torque reform. I mean, that plays a big part to a lot of trucking companies. Absolutely.
Shannon Newton 06:49
Also tax issues. There’s a lot of things that do take place at the state level that impact our businesses and our drivers.
Jeremy Kellett 06:55
For driver appreciation week. Now, you’ve got all these people in town, you got all the stuff you got to do, but, I mean, driver appreciation, it
Shannon Newton 07:01
is truck driver appreciation week. So we have a lot of, you know, probably very similar to you, a lot of social media campaigns going on throughout the week to recognize our members and the things that they’re doing for their drivers. But our Association annual event, we actually will be at the TA petrol in North Little Rock On Thursday, passing out free lunch from 10 to two, we’ve got hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken sandwiches, and that’s our tradition, traditional way of celebrating truck driver appreciation. Week, I think we have had about four or 500 lunches in that day to everyone that’s passing through. And so gives us an opportunity to, you know, interact, like you said, with the drivers directly, and let them know that we’re appreciative of the job that they do. It is often a thankless job, and sometimes, you know, maybe a week doesn’t feel like enough, or I can understand, you know, the sentiment of, you know, we’re out here working and but, but I do think it’s still important, regardless of how many we reach, or how what the level of penetration is there, that the ones that we can, that we do let them know that we’re appreciative. Yeah,
Jeremy Kellett 08:02
you can’t reach all of them, but, you know, I know a lot of people make efforts constantly getting emails from Pilot Flying, J ta petrol, these Travel Stops loves, you know, they always, hey, send this out to your drivers. Free this, free that during this whole week. So I think, you know, hopefully everybody’s getting touched by some of that.
Shannon Newton 08:19
Yeah, we also have two billboards up in the state of Arkansas trying to educate just, you know, every everyday, average citizens of truck driver appreciation week, and kind of refresh their memory about the important role that truck drivers play in their everyday
Jeremy Kellett 08:32
lives. Yeah, because they are important, and they have more of a challenge now than I think they’ve ever had driving on today’s roads. It’s definitely a challenge.
Shannon Newton 08:41
It is, and we want, you know, the average Arkansans to reflect and understand the job that the truck drivers have and the role that they’re playing. And
Jeremy Kellett 08:51
probably, you know, it was more exposed during covid Four years ago, but I think now maybe people have a little more spec they understand a little bit more of when they’re not getting stuff. Truck drivers gotta bring it,
Shannon Newton 09:03
right? I do think that we have benefited from covid in some fashion, in just the way that people have a better understanding of the trucking industry.
Jeremy Kellett 09:12
I hope so. Let’s talk. Let’s jump into this one, just because it was kind of I noticed something important to you we were visiting a while ago, and that’s this freight fraud and cargo theft, that’s hard to wrap my mind around on how much that’s happening and that is becoming a real problem. Yeah, so
Shannon Newton 09:30
Back in the fall, I was at a meeting of the American Trucking Associations, and this issue came up from some carriers in the room, kind of beginning to broach the subject of what is being done, or what can we do. Less than 60 days later, we had a meeting back in Little Rock with our Arkansas tracking Association board, and completely unconnected, different carriers, different setting, without any prompting, had a different set of carriers raise the issue, and kind of like I mentioned before, I think this issue is not new. I. I think historically, carriers and drivers have been hesitant to talk about it. You know, people don’t want to disclose or lead a conversation with you know, this is my percentage of shrinkage or loss or whatever associated with cargo theft, but the frequency, the sophistication, the volume and the value at which this is happening, how, what kind of numbers those are. So the cargo net estimate is $331 million for 220 for two, for 2023 the value is $331 million in cargo fit, and that’s those that were reported. So again, if you go back to the thought that, you know there’s some percentage, probably a significant percentage, if it goes unreported or not caught. You know, through that filter into the cargo net database. Because of that, we now as an industry have to become willing to share and willing to talk about this challenge, what we need from law enforcement, what we need and coordination. Now we’re going to have to share in order to garner those resources and that attention. It’s very difficult sometimes to connect these instances that may happen in a vacuum. So you have, you know, a county sheriff who maybe sees it, you know, three or four times a year. But what they don’t know is that it’s also happening, you know, four counties over and without some sort of federal or oversight infrastructure, database system that’s targets, tracking and really targeting these particular types of crime. It’s going to be very difficult to push back and
Jeremy Kellett 11:29
be like a drug task force or something to concentrate on that. Yeah,
Shannon Newton 11:33
It is almost like a dedicated source. And you know, again, with some of the things we talked about earlier, I don’t think that even law enforcement, whether it be Homeland Security, Homeland Security or FBI or state police, is aware of the degree of sophistication that we’re talking about here. We’re talking about there’s a cyber element, where we’ve had a couple instances where databases have been hacked, email addresses have been changed, and brokers or carriers who are doing all the right things and trying to you know, utilize the email address that’s in the FMCSA database, but that email address has been phished and hacked, and so you’ve got these false verifications and full trailer loads being loaded onto a carrier and hauled off before they ever knew it was, you know, that doesn’t
Jeremy Kellett 12:14
exist, correct? Wow, so they’re actually getting the load from the people. They’re loading the trailer and then the and then, and then, when it doesn’t show up its destination, I guess the carrier broker is going,
Shannon Newton 12:25
huh, yeah. And at that point, it’s, you know, three, four or five days, you know,
Jeremy Kellett 12:30
similar, yeah, similar to the fuel card fraud. They’re so sophisticated in this stuff that these criminals are not stupid, yeah.
Shannon Newton 12:39
And something else I found interesting is that there, you know, when we say cargo theft, I think people often think, you know, pharmaceuticals and televisions and tennis shoes and kind of these high value, easily turnable goods, but I have found that they’re willing to take just about anything, if it’s free. One of the most egregious cases that we discovered in some of these conversations actually involved peanut butter. And I was like, I don’t know that it would have ever occurred to me that peanut butter was a
Jeremy Kellett 13:07
targeted, no, that’s what they were still, they
Shannon Newton 13:09
I know, I know, they had an entire warehouse. They had been skimming pallets of peanut butter off multiple shipments. And I just, you know, if, I guess if it’s free,
Jeremy Kellett 13:17
yes, then sell it for something, right? But who knows,
Shannon Newton 13:21
and all these third party seller websites, I mean, that it’s just, it’s just gotten so much easier to turn merchandise with
Jeremy Kellett 13:28
the internet. Yeah? Well, it’s a problem. It’s gonna have to be addressed, for sure. Yeah, definitely. It’ll leave it up to each carrier. I mean, like you said, Hey, wherever it was stolen, that authority are they? Can they do they have the abilities and the stuff to work with to track it down,
Shannon Newton 13:44
right? And so you mentioned earlier, the legislation. And so there is an effort. And unfortunately, in this case, really the federal resources are best suited, because this type of crime is crossing state lines, and it is that sophisticated. And so we really do need someone. I think Homeland Security is probably where it’s going to land, or where the jurisdiction is right now for this particular issue, so specific resources, a task force and some sort of, you know, unified umbrella to try to capture this information of what’s happening across all states. Yeah, yeah, it’s
Jeremy Kellett 14:19
something that’s going to have to be addressed somehow. I don’t know. It’s a little frustrating. We were talking and switching gears here a little bit about the hair testing. Read your article and a magazine this past week, and I thought, you know, I need to dig a little deeper in that, because I hear about this and so our listeners understand hair testing with there are, you can do some hair testing for drugs and it’s pre employment. Maybe it was random but I was reading an article on how some carriers are doing this, you know. But what I think the big problem is it’s that the Clearinghouse doesn’t really. Recognize hair testing. So what do I mean by the Clearinghouse? So the Clearinghouse is a database that we put in every trucking company. Every time you do a pre employment or random it goes into the clearing house. Well, if it’s positive, it goes into the clearing house. That way, everybody, all the trucking companies all over the United States share this Clearinghouse. They have to go into the clearinghouse to see if your candidate that you’re recruiting is tested positive, and so hair testing is not included in that. So you got some companies that were doing hair testing that may get the results. Well, it’s not that FMCSA does not recognize hair testing, just urine testing. So what kind of problem has that created? Yeah,
Shannon Newton 15:44
so I think I can provide a little bit of perspective here, and then I can I think perhaps you are not even aware. So the drug and alcohol Clearinghouse at the federal level was actually born in Arkansas. Arkansas, yeah, our federal delegation were the ones who introduced that concept at the federal level, and we had a state database up in operation for several years prior to the federal database, and it was necessitated out of individuals who were essentially job shopping. And so they would apply at one carrier and fail a drug test, you know, wait 30 days and go apply for a job at the next carrier, never revealing to that carrier that they had tested positive at this employer that they never actually went to work for. And so there was a loophole in catching these positive drug tests. And as an industry, we don’t want drug users on the road. That obviously creates a safety issue. It creates an image issue. And there’s all sorts of reasons why we were for capturing and excluding those individuals from driving commercial equipment absent there, you know, getting clear and getting recertified to come back to work. So, we instituted that clearinghouse to try to alleviate the problem that I just talked about. Advocated for it all the way through the federal level. And then we have this challenge of hair testing. And so that’s it’s a very similar issue, and the carriers and the legislators who are involved in the initial Clearinghouse are kind of the same ones who are still at the table on this issue. We have been advocating for hair testing to be recognized at the federal level for almost a decade, really, and have been successful in getting Congress to mandate that HHS develop a rule to recognize hair testing, and they have continued to drag their feet and like we talked earlier, super frustrated with some of the things at the federal level. But from the carrier’s perspective, not only are they going above and beyond to try to protect their own equipment and their own insurance costs and things of that nature, they’re still having to do the urinalysis, just because they’re here testing, they’re still required to do your analysis. So from their perspective, they’re incurring these additional expenses, going above and beyond, to filter their own driver fleet, but then unavailable. They don’t have any opportunity to share this information. And so we’re kind of back where we start. You know, we’ve made all this progress to close the loophole for your analysis, and now we as hair testing becomes more popular. More carriers are using it. We now have created this loophole all over again, with individuals who may test positive on a hair test, pass the urinalysis, be declined that job opportunity, wait 30 days. And in this case, I guess they’re not going to be here for the test. They don’t have to wait 30 days. So to wait for their days. They can go show up somewhere the next day. And that positive hair test never goes anywhere, peers or is reported to any entity.
Jeremy Kellett 18:33
Yeah, that is a I never realized that because it said the sarcophagi, said the trucking Alliance, bunch of, I mean, like 70,000 70,000 truck drivers between all these companies are doing it. And I just, you know, that would be hard, probably, if I was one of those companies and I knew a guy tested positive with a hair sample. So you say they can with that, but not with urine, because you’re in like, five days or something, right? And then, knowing they walk out the door, and I can’t tell anybody that they just tested positive on a hair sample, and they’re going in, next company, next door, getting in a truck and driving,
Shannon Newton 19:14
right? Yeah, you can imagine. I have talked to some of the recruiting directors and safety directors at those companies, and at some point, the volume of those individuals gets to a point where you have this uneasiness about knowing how many of them may still be out there employed as a driver, and knowing that, you know, I got to get in my car and drive home this afternoon. And you know, everybody that I know and love is also driving to school or work or vacation or soccer or whatever, today, and how do I passionately advocate and help other people understand the importance of sharing this information that I have? I think it’s important that we clarify that as we talk about hair testing and as we talk about the declaring house that as industry advocates and even those companies who are using it. Right? They’re not advocating that everybody should or that everybody has to. They’re just advocating that we are, can we please be recognized for what we’re doing, and can we share the information that we have? And I think that benefits everybody in the industry, and I don’t understand why we’re having such trouble getting to that solution, but
Jeremy Kellett 20:19
they can, I guess they can share that. Man is so hard, though, because when you send an employment verification to a company nowadays, well, now a lot of times we don’t even ask the drug questions, because you got the Clearinghouse right, supposed to solve all that problem, right? That may be
Shannon Newton 20:36
absent some real due diligence, because you’re still just going to get, you know, eligible for, you know, yes, these days, eligible for your yes, no. Thank you. Bye.
Jeremy Kellett 20:44
That’s it. That’s about it. And then you check the Clearinghouse, yeah, because you don’t get a whole lot of information anyway. So
Shannon Newton 20:50
I think it’s, you know, from a carrier perspective, there is a little bit of false security in printing, that piece of paper, printing in
Jeremy Kellett 20:57
the file. Challenges I am that isn’t, you know, for years, I knew that Arkansas had the database because we had to, you know, every time we had one with the Arkansas CDL, we go, Hey, you run Arkansas. We holler down there. Do you run Arkansas? You gotta run Arkansas too. Yeah, you know, even though you get all your references back. But then the Clearinghouse came out. And I even called and said, Hey, we don’t have to do this anymore. Do we? They said, No, you got your clearing house. You’re good. Yeah.
Shannon Newton 21:23
Again, to go back to full circle here at the State Legislature, we actually passed that first at the state level and created a state database while they were working on the federal one. And then eventually were able to roll our data
Jeremy Kellett 21:32
up until I feel just a small part of that, even though I didn’t do
Shannon Newton 21:38
anything, you call Arkansas, you call Arkansas home,
Jeremy Kellett 21:40
yeah, just from Arkansas, you know, Oh my What about this $2 million verdict and on? I don’t know. I’m sure everybody’s heard about this, but maybe not some listeners are, you know, maybe not associated with trucking that are some of our listeners. But they sum it up, a vehicle. It’s a rear inclusion, rear inclusion vehicle hit the rear end of a trailer, and unfortunately, both people in it passed away. And the attorneys of those people went after the trailer manufacturer that created the trailer back in 1994 I believe, 94 and said that. I mean, they got a $462 million verdict because they claimed that the manufacturer hadn’t been updating.
Shannon Newton 22:32
The manufacturer should have known that there was better technology available. Yeah.
Jeremy Kellett 22:37
I mean, I read something about because the reason, how they came up with that number was That’s the money they’ve saved over all these years by not making changes to all these trailers. But it’s a trailer manufacturer you buy, they sell a trailer, they have no idea what the guy’s going to do with it or how long it’s going to be on the road. I understand that. Yeah,
Shannon Newton 22:55
It’s a very slippery slope. You know, there are specific manufacturing requirements that are outlined by NHTSA, I believe, is the federal entity that you know every time your truck can only be so tall, it can only be so wide, it can only weigh so much. One and those same things exist for trailers. And according to the regulations at the time that the trailer was manufactured, it’s street legal. And so how you at this point, 30 years later, say that the manufacturer is somehow responsible for the fact that it’s still on the road and not as safe as trailers that have been manufactured in more recent years. I’m not sure to me, it is a leap to make the manufacturer responsible for equipment that was produced 30 years they
Jeremy Kellett 23:46
convinced a jury up in St Louis that that was it. And I read that the party hated two people who lost their lives. It’s terrible, terrible, but you know, putting the blame on somebody right is another thing, right? That, plus it said it wasn’t admissible that you know that their blood alcohol, the driver was over the limit, and they weren’t wearing their seat belts, but they were going 45 miles an hour, yeah, 5545 to 55 miles an hour. And hit it in the rear and
Shannon Newton 24:15
right. And again, it is a super tragedy. I don’t want to just say that at all, but in any circumstance, you know, in any accident, there’s blame to go around, yeah, and to attach that 400 and something million dollars to manufacture. But
Jeremy Kellett 24:34
the big picture is that’s the prime example of what’s happening these days when you know these nuclear verdicts that are coming out with some of this stuff, whether it’s a manufacturer, you know, something in the transportation world, I mean, that’s where they’re they know that we got to have a whole lot of insurance, and they come after it,
Shannon Newton 24:51
yeah, well, and just, of course, that’s going to be appealed. And so, you know, I don’t want to, yeah, get too far ahead of ourselves, as though that’s the law of the land. But it certainly creates an opportunity where you’re going to see more trial attorneys just give them a new, I guess, play to run, from their perspective about potential individuals to sue, potential jackpot justice opportunities for them, it’s definitely a negative development. I know we’ve talked before about these verdicts and the cost associated with them. And you and I both know, and probably most people listening know that nothing is there is no free lunch. All that goes right back into the cost of the equipment. Meaning that four, $60 million verdict is going to go into the cost of equipment going forward, because every other trailer manufacturer is now going to be concerned. All of the people who insure trailer manufacturers are all going to be concerned. And so you know that cost is just baked into the system, and we’re all going to continue to absorb it. By
Jeremy Kellett 25:52
the last time I had you on here, it’s been a while, but you were going, you were supposed to work on getting these billboards down, these TV commercials down on hit by a truck. How’s that going? No,
Shannon Newton 26:02
still makes my blood boil every time I Oh, me too. See one of those stinking commercials?
Jeremy Kellett 26:12
Me too. Me too. Oh, this, I didn’t ask you about it’s kind of off topic, and you don’t have to say anything if you don’t. I didn’t know if you were still part of
Shannon Newton 26:21
the project zero. So Project Zero is a nonprofit organization here in the state of Arkansas that is focused on adoption from foster care. And so I think a lot of people don’t know, in Arkansas, we have, I think the numbers 221 children who are parentalists. They are available for adoption, their parental rights have been terminated, and they are in the foster care system, awaiting a match with a potential family. And so it’s a pretty heavy topic, and something that, you know, I just kind of was raised in a pretty sheltered environment, and became aware of that as an adult, that there were, you know, I have two teenagers of my own, and to imagine a teenager trying to navigate today’s life without the security of a family is pretty, pretty heavy and pretty tragic. So my work with Project Zero, raising awareness about the need of Building Hope in waiting kids and trying, you know, we do a lot of events trying. Project prom is kind of one of the more popular ones, where we take, you know, teenage girls and give them the shopping experience that they were not going to have, absent that absent the organization’s involvement, you know, take them to Dillards, let them pick out a dress and the shoes and the jewelry and all the accessories, and just trying to create those experiences that they are unfortunately missing out On while they wait on a match with a family, that’s awesome. It’s something that I’ve truly enjoyed. With happy endings, the work can be pretty heavy in the interim. Oh, yeah,
Jeremy Kellett 27:51
I bet that just dealing with them and spending time with them makes a difference. Yeah, but you know, that’s, that’s, that’s a neat little project you’re into there.
Shannon Newton 28:02
I do enjoy it, and it’s very rewarding. And I will say I’ve been on the board now probably, I guess, eight years or so. The number of kids in Arkansas has continued to decline over that 221 actually was just released within the last 30 days. It’s a new law in Arkansas for children that are awaiting adoption in foster care. So yes, the work of Project Zero, it’s been nationally recognized. Arkansas is actually the only state that has this particular nonprofit executive director is a very gifted woman named Christy Irwin. And so the work that they’re doing is making a difference in Arkansas. How do people find out about that project zero? The project zero.org?
Jeremy Kellett 28:39
There you go. Okay, go check it out. I guess the last thing, which I feel like we got to talk a little bit about, is the Arkansas Arkansas Trucking Association. And what are the benefits of the Arkansas Trucking Association and people, you know trucking companies being members, from small to large? Yeah, I
Shannon Newton 28:56
I think that thank you for the opportunity the Arkansas Trucking Association exists to protect, promote and serve the trekking industry in Arkansas, and you can walk through that pretty simply. I mean, protect that based on the things that we’ve talked about. There’s lots of opportunities to protect the industry from bad ideas becoming bad policy, whether that’s at a city council level, the state legislature level, or at the federal level. There’s certainly individuals, just because of our high frequency engagement with the public, who may think that they have a great idea about how to make their community better or safer, and just not understand the realistic impacts of of what the industry does and how it’s, you know, that service that we’re providing promote, again, shaping the way that people think about tracking I finally figured out how to say that in one sentence. I struggled with that for 15 years before I came up with what exactly it is that we do, but shaping the way that people think about trucking that enables everything else that we do to be easier if people understand the role that we play. People understand the role, both from a tax base, economic base, a jobs perspective, if you have that you know in the back of your mind, it helps you be a little bit more understanding. Of the truck in front of you, or the package that’s late, or the, you know, regulations that we’re trying to operate under. And then, from a server perspective, that’s really where we engage with the members to try to provide them. Our little internal winners like to hang around with winners. And we’ve got a lot of winners in Arkansas, when you start talking about the trucking industry and who’s here, and so providing a framework and a networking opportunity to allow small companies and their safety directors to come to lunch and sit right next to the safety director at some of the best companies, best tracking companies in the country, that is something that’s unique that we’re able to provide, and have found, gotten a lot of good feedback, that there’s a lot of value in building those relationships, setting the stage to help educate them about all these issues that we’ve talked about. Because I think, you know, trucking is one of those things. It’s really hard to see. You know, past the end of the hood, it feels like things are coming at you so fast. There’s, you know, bugs and rain and whatever’s happening, you know, between here and there. And sometimes it’s hard to peel that back and look at some of the things that maybe you know, 3060, 90 days down the road, just regulatory issues, if you’re not reading the newspaper, if you’re not engaged in, you know, local politics, which I understand a lot of people aren’t. You just don’t. You just don’t know. And it’s nice to have somebody else out there informing you when there’s an opportunity to engage or take care of things on your behalf if you just choose not to. Yeah,
Jeremy Kellett 31:21
networking, creating, I mean, having that small safety carrier, small company, talk to that guy and then, and I think a lot of people don’t realize, I mean, yes, they may be in competition, but they share, they talk, they I was gonna say,
Shannon Newton 31:37
especially when it comes to safety, if you don’t know safety and maintenance and kind of, you know, like accounting software and those types of things, our experience is that carriers are more than eager to share, and that benefits everybody. I mean, I understand that times are tough, and maybe there’s not, doesn’t feel like there’s enough freight for everybody today, but in the long term, you know, the grand scheme of things, there’s plenty of freight to provide for all of the trucking companies in Arkansas to be successful.
Jeremy Kellett 32:07
Arkansas Trucking Association, Arkansas trucking.com There you go. Check them out. If you’re not a member, see what kind of benefits you can get because anything from mentorship to insurance to all kinds of good information. So anything else you want to cover that was good?
Shannon Newton 32:22
No, this has been great. I appreciate you having me. Yeah, it’s
Jeremy Kellett 32:25
it’s always good to have some good information. Appreciate everybody listening to the Oakley podcast, man, you guys are awesome. We’re going to try to keep bringing you some good stuff. But most of all, this week, thank you truck driver. That’s what it’s all about this week. All over the nation, and do your part and thank them. Every time you get a chance, we appreciate y’all. Thanks for listening. We’ll talk to you next week. Thanks for listening to this episode with Oakley podcast, trucking, business and family. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate or review the show in the podcast platform of your choice and share it with a friend. We love hearing from our audience. So if you’ve got a question, comment or just want to say hello, head over to our website, theokepodcast.com, and click the leave a comment button. We’ll get you a response soon, and may even share some of the best ones here on the show. We’ll be back with a fresh episode very soon. Thanks for listening.