An unlikely duo, the California Department of Motor Vehicles and the National Private Truck Council, have blasted the proposed 122 percent increase in Unified Carrier Registration Agreement fees.

In separate comments submitted to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, the California DMV and the Truck Council said the proposed fee increase was unreasonable, unfair and illegal, and a clumsy attempt by the FMCSA and UCRA-member states to transfer the risk of widespread noncompliance to those truck and bus companies that obey the law and pay the fees.

The National Private Truck Council is a trade group composed of truck fleets operated by companies that arent in the transportation business but operate over-the-road trucks to support their operations. Its members include companies like Wal-Mart and giant grocery chains, as well as smaller distribution companies.

In comments filed in response to a proposed FMCSA rulemaking that would more than double UCRA fees next year, the Truck Council said that while it opposes the increase for a variety of reasons, the No. 1 reason is because it is unreasonable and therefore a violation of the law that created the Unified Carrier Registration system.

The council points out that the UCR Act allows the UCR board to ask the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to adjust the fees "within a reasonable range" on an annual basis. Anything more than a 61 percent increase for 2010 -- because of a major change in the way commercial vehicles are counted -- is clearly unreasonable, the council asserts.

The council also notes that states receiving UCRA fees have not engaged "in any effective enforcement of the existing UCR fee structure. Nor has the UCR board audited the enforcement activities of the states.

"Raising the UCR fees by 122 percent allows the states to avoid their responsibility to ensure that all potential registrants pay the fees and thereby increases the burden on those registrants who lawfully pay the fees," the council said.

Finally, the council accused UCRA-member states of possibly violating the UCR Act because they havent demonstrated they are spending the UCR fee money for motor carrier safety programs, enforcement or administration of the plan as required by law.

In its comments, the California DMV said the data contained in the federal Motor Carrier Management Information System thats used to calculate the fees is "very inaccurate due to poor carrier reporting and a confusing interstate carrier definition, resulting in incorrect UCR fee calculations and low revenue collections."

It said a more accurate UCR fee calculation should be based on the International Registration Plan count of interstate carriers as each IRP carrier must receive a credential annually for each vehicle. This would ensure an absolute, accurate count of active carriers and eliminate any confusion regarding "interstate" carriers.

"The fees would fluctuate marginally each year and payment compliance would improve as the fees would be affixed to the IRP credential process," said the DMV.

Like the Truck Council, the California DMV noted that the proposed fee hike would increase the burden on UCR-compliant carriers "while benefiting those carriers who continue to be noncompliant."

UCR fee collections have been low since the inception of the program in 2007. Collections have hovered at about 65 percent of the total amount needed to achieve the statutory level of $108 million.

The proposed fee increase will "only punish those carriers who currently comply. The fees must apply to all with a reasonable expectation of compliance," said the DMV.

Among factors cited in the DMV comments for the low level of compliance with the UCR program was the "weak" enforcement efforts by non-UCR participating states to collect fees from their home state carriers and no incentive for UCR participating states to collect UCR fees from intrastate carriers since the revenue the state is able to retain is capped and, if they collect a UCR fee, the state is prohibited from collecting any intrastate fees thereby losing revenue.

To fix the problems, the California DMV advocates applying the UCR fee to IRP vehicles because they actually cross interstate boundaries; requiring all states to participate in UCR; eliminating the revenue collection cap for each state, providing a strong incentive to collect, and eliminating the prohibition of collection of intrastate fees to also provide states incentive to collect the UCR fees.