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Proposal Axes Pay For CSX Flagmen
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Published: January 24, 2008
TALLAHASSEE - State Rep. Ed Homan said Wednesday that he plans to file legislation to stop Florida from paying CSX Transportation for railroad crossing maintenance and flagmen on public road projects.
The Tampa Tribune reported last year that CSX charges state and local governments millions to station flagmen on road projects near the company's rails. The flagmen are there to monitor train traffic and warn road workers when trains are coming, even when the workers are far from the rails for weeks at a time.
The Tribune also reported that the state pays CSX hundreds of thousands every year for routine crossing maintenance, despite federal laws that require rail companies to maintain their own crossings. The laws spell out in detail the railroads' responsibility to make sure that lights flash and gates go down when trains approach a public road crossing.
Homan, a Tampa Republican and chairman of the House Committee on Audit and Performance, questioned the spending, especially at a time when lawmakers are facing a $2.5 billion shortfall this fiscal year and next.
"For a company that has rather generous revenue and profit streams ... this might be something that we can say, maybe we don't need to do this anymore," Homan said at Wednesday's committee hearing.
Most states don't pay the annual fees, and some of them have better crossing safety records than Florida.
Florida is one of about 17 states that pay a portion of the annual maintenance costs, said state Department of Transportation rail administrator Fred Wise.
Florida pays half of what the railroads say it costs them to keep up their crossing signs, gates and lights, Wise told Homan's committee. That came to more than $625,000 last year, with most of the money going to CSX, the state's largest railroad.
The state also hires its own inspectors, in addition to federal inspectors, to make sure crossing signals work.
"That's another responsibility we take very seriously," Wise said. "It's something the Legislature weighed in on in the mid-1970s" because of railroad companies' lack of attention to maintenance.
In addition to the state, some local governments pay for maintenance on the crossings over their city and county roads. Hillsborough County, for instance, paid more than $250,000. Officials said they were following the state's lead.
CSX spokesman Gary Sease said Florida's partnerships in railway maintenance and safety have resulted in a low accident rate, but he said the company will continue to maintain its 3,000 public crossings in Florida, regardless of whether the state pays part of the cost.
Although it's the state's choice to reimburse CSX and other railroads for maintenance costs, the use of flagmen is a different matter.
CSX requires that state and local governments use the company's flagmen at construction projects near the company's railroad tracks.
In its investigation last year, the Tribune found that flagmen charges exceeded $3 million between 2003 and 2006. The CSX flagmen were paid up to $25 an hour to sit in their vehicles and watch the tracks, even when no trains were running and workers were hundreds of feet from the rails.
The agencies signed contracts for the service, but the railroad sets the terms.
On Wednesday, Craig Camuso, CSX regional vice president for public affairs, blamed that arrangement largely on mandates from the railroad workers union. The union requires CSX to hire its own employees into flagmen positions, he said, and to pay them full time for the duration of their assignment.
He said the agreements require CSX to pay those employees full time for the period in which flagging work may be required, regardless of how often they actually perform their duties.
On-again, off-again work for flagmen is not usually an option, he said.
In response, Homan suggested the state take over the task.
"You're doing this to satisfy the group of people who work for you, who belong to the union," he said. "So it seems like it would be great for you guys if we just took this off your hands. ... We could provide our own people, and they could just be there for the one day that they're going to be working in the area rather than two weeks."
Sease countered that safety is of equal concern.
"We want a trained employee, someone who understands the railroad business, understands CSX policy, safety rules, federal regulations," Sease said after the hearing. "We want someone who we are darned sure is out there and understands the train movements that are going to happen that day. We are not at this point willing to talk about having an outside party perform those duties."
Homan, however, wants the state's flagmen costs to go down, he said. He likened the relationship between Florida and CSX to a parent's relationship with an adult child whose time has come to "get off the payroll." He has until week's end to submit his legislation, he said.
The lawmaker also said his committee intends to hold hearings in the coming weeks on the half-billion-dollar deal the state has with CSX.
Reporter Catherine Dolinski can be reached at (850) 222-8382 or cdolinski@tampatrib.com.
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