LANSING - A plan co-sponsored by State Representative Terry Brown (D-Pigeon) to protect farmers and speed up delivery of their crops by changing the way that trucks are weighed has passed both the House and Senate and now heads to the Governor's desk to be signed into law.
"During the harvest season, time is money - and our farmers are losing both simply because of Michigan's outdated system of weighing trucks," said Brown, a member of the House Agriculture Committee. "Making farmers decouple their trailers to weigh in takes up a lot of time and gas that they simply can't afford, and it also puts them in a dangerous position. Allowing trucks to be weighed in different ways will help ensure that Thumb-area farmers can deliver sugar beets and other major crops in a safe and timely manner."
Currently, only some Michigan scales are able to accommodate a truck with multiple trailers and take the weight of the vehicle as one measurement. This system of requiring farmers to weigh their loads in multiple measurements due to short scales causes costly delays and dangerous maneuvers.
Under the plan that Brown co-sponsored, trucks pulling multiple trailers will now be allowed to be weighed either as a single unit, while coupled or by totaling the weights of each individual trailer. The change is supported by Michigan Sugar Co. and the Michigan Agri-Business Association.
"Changing Michigan's truck-weighing procedures is an example of common-sense solutions that help protect and create local jobs, which has to be our top priority each and every day," Brown said. "The sugar beet industry and farming as a whole provide a good living for thousands of families in our Thumb communities, and I will keep doing everything I can to ensure that our agricultural economy thrives."