The beginning of a new year brings time for reflection on goals accomplished in the last twelve months and challenges ahead that we need to tackle. As we enter President Trump’ s second year in office, not to mention a midterm election year, we need to be laser-focused on the key policy issues most impacting chemical distributors.
Fortunately, the passage of comprehensive tax reform legislation at the end of last year gave NACD members some holiday cheer. Unfortunately, we also saw the lapse of the General System of Preferences (GSP) program December 31. Sadly, GSP never should have lapsed as there is bipartisan support for it in both chambers of Congress. On top of that, the White House believesGSP renewal is important to this country and must be reauthorized for the next three years. GSP renewal will certainly be on NACD’s top legislative priorities in 2018!
And while the signing into law of the CFATS Act of 2014 that reauthorized the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) program for four years might just seem like yesterday, Congress is tasked once again with reauthorizing the program that expires at the end of 2018. Conventional wisdom would indicate that a CFATS reauthorization bill would be easy to accomplish, even during a midterm election year, but sadly our politics have become very toxic. Regardless, NACD will aggressively pursue a renewal of this important program as soon as possible and work with all stakeholders to make sure our voice is heard.
Infrastructure development remains high on the president’s wish list, with Congress loving the idea of landing money to improve our country’s aging national transportation infrastructure with their jobs on the line in November. NACD supports making our freight networks – including highways, bridges, and rail systems – work better for the U.S. economy. So, look forward to seeing us fight for that goal this year.
Regulatory reform always remains a top priority for NACD, and 2018 serves as a grand opportunity for Congress to codify those regulatory changes that the Trump administration already made to allow American businesses to do what they do best – provide jobs and grow this nation’s economy.
Of course, rail reform is still desperately needed because NACD member companies continue to encounter unnecessary rate increases and shipment delays from rail providers.
Despite these ongoing challenges, 2018 did start off on a positive note. The U.S. Department of Labor issued a proposed rulemaking on the creation of association health plans that would allow NACD member companies to band together to provide their employees with better, more affordable health insurance offerings. NACD has been pouring through the 80-plus-page proposal to see what next steps we can propose the agency take to make this offering a reality for our members in the coming months and years!
While midterm election years can be challenging to secure passage of important legislation, I remain hopeful that, with lots of hard work and a little luck, 2018 will be a year when we will see measures important to the chemical distribution industry approved by Congress and signed by President Trump.