Legislators optimistic about Ohio bill to provide resources for CDL training.

There is a bill in Ohio presented by two legislators, that if passed would pay 50% of employer expenses to train truck drivers that are under a four-year tax credit capped at $25,000 per company. House bill 197 has been pending since a March 15 hearing. Co-sponsored by 52 legislators, (39-R and 13-D) and passed unanimously in Ohio on Feb. 9 during their 134^th General Assembly. It’s hard to tell the future of the bill since they are at recess for the summer.

If the bill passes and becomes law, then it will incentivize employers to train their employees to obtain commercial driver’s licenses. This in turn would boost employee wages and increase the number of CDL drivers during this national shortage in the industry. Currently, employee wages during their training period are not covered by the credit and would be applied to ordinary employer costs when training an employee. Ohio has decided to reward a total of $1.5 million in credits, annually. If this bill passes, it will hopefully take the stress off those who are not able to acquire as many CDL trained drivers due to the lack of wages. There will be a maximum credit of $25,000 allotted per company allowing the potential for three to five newly trained drivers per company.