Coast Gaurd TWIC card

Anybody have or need to get the TWIC card. My employer messed around and now at the last minute wants us to go get one.

For those of you that have never heard of this card I will explain it.

It is a federal background check to allow un-escorted access to coast guard regulated sites such as ports or any place that has water (boat)access. Part of the Home Land security act.

I wonder if grain elevators that have river frontage are also included.

I can see this having big repercussions on the trucking industry or at least some entrepreneur starting up a small business to shuttle trailers into and out of secure sites.
Think about it.........
Many truck drivers do not load at ports very often so they will not have the card. They will either have to have someone that does have a card pull there trailer into the port for loading or pass on the load. That may drive up rates because not everyone will be able to haul these loads.
Transportation Security Administration

It looks like Lockheed landed a good Federal contract. Since they are collecting the fees, are they responsible for any terrorists that slip through the system ?

Sounds like a good business opportunity for someone that lives in the area, big a$$ parking area, couple of trucks with drivers that have the card and there ya go.

The truck can be escorted by an employee with a card - but that of course raises the costs. My simple understanding, only read of it yesterday.

All these homeland security things are a fine idea, if we were 1000 people & kept on our tows. With 300 million, there are just too many gaps for such things to really ever work out to ensure anything.

--->Paul

John, I am a consultant engineer offshore and I got my TWIC card last March...$132.50! All the drilling companies are requiring their hands to get this card.The escort rule will be used, but the majority of the workers will get the card just out of convenience.

My neighbor and a buddy were howling about it the other night. The one of them hauls a lot of fuel from marine depots. His company hauls a lot of jet fuel for the military, so he already has a whole wallet full of ID cards for airports and bases. This will be just one more.

Arguments for the TWIC are basically to require the sort of check and identification that's required for access to the secure areas of an airport, and applying that to marine ports. Not a bad idea as far as it goes.

The cost is a little crazy. $132.50, or $105.25 if you've had a similar background check for another purpose. It's not clear if the background check required to get and keep a hazmat endorsement on your license is considered "similar" enough to qualify for the lower cost. Having one replaced costs only $60, which suggests to me there's a revenue consideration attached to all this in addition to enhancing security.

They also seem to make it difficult to acquire. You have to appear in person to apply and then, four weeks later appear to pick it up. They won't mail it. I looked up a local port, and their registration center is a small building with no turnaround or parking for trucks. The port in question is nothing more than a tank farm with racks for loading twelve trucks. Everybody from local independent fuel dealers loading 4000 gal of #2 to fuel distributors from upstate hauling 9000 gal of regular five hours back to the northern reaches of the state. All of those folks are going to need a card, and it appears that at least those hauling trailers will have to make two separate trips in something other than a big truck to get to the center to apply for and pick them up. That can be two ten-hour trips for some of those people.

It would make a lot more sense to have the center located right at the port, and maybe that's the case with some of the larger ones, but certainly not in this case.

What also isn't clear from their website is what ports require TWICs. Around here, I can think of three ports, Bangor, Bucksport and Searsport. Bangor and Bucksport are nothing but tank farms and racks. Searsport handles bulk carriers and containers as well as fuel. Only Bangor is listed. Maybe the other two are administratively viewed as part of the Port of Bangor??? I don't know. I can't imagine them being excluded.

If nothing else, I'd say the rollout is kind of a half-baked mess, about the same as how the Feds rolled out the secure ID requirements on the states for drivers' licenses.

Yes the driver can be escorted but lets look at that.
Every place I go that has water access will require the card and this includes all the grain elevators.

I do not know how the grain elevators are set up in your area but our elevators are on the Mississippi river for barge/ship loading and unloading. I would think a lot of the elevators up north may not be on the water and deal in trains so they can be close to the farm but there must be some that are on the rivers.

From what I understand these elevators will require the card also. That means if you are a farmer that delivers his grain to a elevator with water access you will need a card if the unloading spot is within the secure area.

Now can you see the elevator providing a escort to every truck they unload.
Every place I have talked to says get the card or stay out. No escorts will be available.

They have told us our Haz-Mat will be allowed for the reduced cost. Does not really matter to me because the company is paying for it. That is why we have had a hold up in getting the card.
30 drivers X 105.25 = $3157.50

From what we have been told any place that has water access will require the card.
I know around here the port; oil refineries; grain elevators; ect all require we get the card.

Both of the centers around here are located in a small suite in the bussiness section of town. One has no truck parking but the other is in a bussiness park and the trucks are just parking on the side of the road.
These sites serve the Port of New Orleans so the big ports are just as screwed up as the small ones.

Can you say more government? Just another tax as far as I'm concerned.

I'm on the fire dept, and EMS so does that mean if there is a fire do we take time to get a card after we are called? Maybe a escort?

I certanly hope most of the folks here get the fact that homeland security is just another way to make us feel that they are doing something. They are taxing you again. Anyone want to guess the cost of these cards in a few years, and also, soon there will be strings attatched, like training or no card renewals.

While I'm a ranting here, any of you older folks remember getting a asprin out of the medicine cabnet as a child? You know, help yourself system?

You can't believe how we treat asprin in our area of the EMS. Not quite like we must get permision from the White house, but it won't be real long.

Diabetic? laying on the ground, and I know you as my best friend? Pricking you finger is getting to be like ....Sorry if you were half out of it I can assist you, but not allowed to do it on my own...so you loose. So sorry my friend.

I best sit down now before I blow a fuse.

North East Iowa