4 issues AmericanHort’s Tal Coley is monitoring in 2019

The 2018 U.S. midterm elections are behind us, and the makeup of Congress changed, but AmericanHort director of government affairs Tal Coley says the organization’s goals remain the same.

“I think we'll still be able to get a lot of things done, primarily because we have champions on both sides of the aisle,” he says. “I think as a trade association, you never want to gravitate toward one side so much so that you're not engaging folks from the other side.”

Coley says the industry has friends it can turn to and trust.

“Whatever happens in 2020 or whatever happens in the next couple of years, I think we're well positioned with a Democratic house — we've worked well with Collin Peterson [a Democrat representing Minnesota’s 7th congressional district] who is likely to be the chair of house agricultural committee, for instance,” Coley says. “He's done some great stuff in the ag sphere, but also in the transportation sphere with the regulations and the electronic logging device mandate. Those lawmakers that work with both sides of the aisle — for instance, like Peterson — those types of folks are the ones that we kind of rallied around.”

Labor

“Obviously, workforce issues are No. 1. I haven't run into anyone who doesn't have workforce issues on their mind. The labor is issue is paramount. It's something my colleague Craig Regelbrugge works on pretty much 100 percent of the time, and he is in the weeds with that stuff. But as I see it, it's something that with the [Trump] administration and their beliefs, and how Congress has kicked the can down the road on a lot of these things — it's just very hard to make headway on some of the labor issues. Granted, it looks like the H-2B cap might get raised. But there are some strings attached to that, and there might be enforcement measures in place as a trade-off. On the H-2A side, I know the administration is making some changes there to make it a bit more user friendly. There's some regulatory guidance out there on not having to put advertisements in newspapers and what not and doing something online. I don't think you'll see anything comprehensive, but even a little bit of relief on an issue like that can go a long way.”

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Transportation

“Transportation issues are something I've been really focused on. Costs are very high; availability is not as high as we'd like it. Some people are having a really hard time finding people to ship their [products]. We've been working on some things — some hours of service flexibility measures. I know the agency that's in charge of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has proposed some tweaks to maybe add a few hours here or there and give drivers more discretion when adverse conditions hit. Is it a silver bullet to the problem? No, but every little bit helps. Will the prices come down in 2019? I guess that's just a question of if we can find more truck drivers, right? Look at the data out there. You already have a labor shortage for people who drive trucks. And you throw a large regulatory paradigm shift on top of that with the electronic logging device (ELD) mandate, and you have the perfect storm in 2018. In 2019, people are a bit more used to it. They are still adjusting, but the agency itself is still out there 11, 12 months later and still trying to explain a lot of the rules and regulations. So, there's still a lot of confusion with that. [The ELD mandate] another shade of labor.”

“There's also the agricultural exemption [for trucking]. We're very vocal on that right now because it's another mitigating type of exemption that can help businesses. If you operate within a 150-mile radius around an agricultural source, that time does not count toward your daily and weekly hour limits. Right now, we're kind of in a gray area. The definition that they use for this ag exemption is very vague. There are some groups there that are specifically spelled out, but there's a lot of interpretation to be had with the definition they use. Some in our industry are using the ag exemption, and I haven't heard any news about getting large amounts of citations. But when we meet officials at the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, they are adamant that we are not included in that exemption. So, I think for peace of mind on our end and to leave no room for interpretation by enforcement officials, it is essential that we get it spelled out that we are included in that exemption.”

Environmental issues

“I also think you're going to see a lot of movement on your environmental issues. There's a lot of action going on with pesticides, and you're seeing lawsuits and court rulings that I think is going to continue into 2019. There are products that we feel are environmentally safe and good for the industry, and we need to fight for them. And a lot of that action is at the state level, but there are a lot of federal [directives] going on with the EPA. I think we are going to focus on that area.”

Taxes

“With the tax bill that was passed last year, this will be the first tax season where a lot of people will be able to utilize some of the new rules and it'll be interesting to see how those play out. I know the IRS is writing new regulations when it comes to that. That's always where the devil in the details matter — the bill says one thing, but the agency interprets it another way. Small business issues are on the agenda too. And there's always an issue or two that you're not prepared for, that comes out of nowhere. For instance, the trucking issue was one for us last year.”

For more: www.AmericanHort.org

Author note: Chris is assistant editor of sister publication Greenhouse Management.