CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s Pre-Employment Screening Program (PSP) is a semifinalist in this year’s Innovations in American Government Awards competition.
The competition is sponsored by the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
The FMCSA program is one of 100 semifinalists competing to be named finalists and a chance to be awarded the $100,000 grand prize in Cambridge this spring.
PSP advanced from a pool of more than 500 applications from all 50 states, and was selected by the Innovations Award evaluators as an example of a novel and effective action whose work has had significant impact and can be replicated across the country and the world.
In response to a 2005 congressional mandate, FMCSA awarded a contract to NIC Federal to create PSP, providing motor carriers with rapid, electronic access to driver safety data for use during the hiring process.
Before the implementation of PSP, this driver safety data was only available through paper-based Freedom of Information Act requests. With PSP’s launch in 2010, motor carriers and background screening companies were granted instant access to a driver’s safety history after obtaining the driver’s written authorization. Drivers may access their own PSP records online anytime.
FMCSA is responsible for all of the PSP program’s data and general oversight, while NIC Federal handles daily operations, customer service, and technology development and maintenance.
According to a study released by FMCSA, PSP positively impacts the safety of America’s roadways. The study shows that motor carriers using PSP have, on average, decreased crash rates by 8 percent and driver out-of-service (OOS) rates by 17 percent. It is estimated that in the 12 months studied, the motor carrier group using PSP prevented 863 crashes and more than 3,500 driver OOS incidents.
“Efficient data access has allowed trucking and bus companies to consider safety information during their hiring decisions,” said Laura Johnson, NIC Federal’s general manager. “I am pleased that the Ash Center chose to recognize PSP for its important contribution to safety.”
The semifinalist programs represent a cross-section of jurisdictions and policy areas and embody one of the most diverse and sophisticated groups that have advanced to this stage in the competition’s 30-year history. They were invited to complete a supplementary application last fall, answering in-depth questions about their work, the process of creating and sustaining their programs, and how they believe they can teach others to do what they do.
“These programs demonstrate that there are no prerequisites for doing the good work of governing,” said Stephen Goldsmith, director of the Innovations in American Government Program at the Ash Center. “Small towns and massive cities, huge federal agencies and local school districts, large budgets or no budgets at all — what makes government work best is the drive to do better, and this group proves that drive can be found anywhere.”
