Profile For Michael Tuomala

Michael, I feel the necessity to respond. I had a really hard time getting hired into this industry, and it was during a time when they would take just about anybody with a pulse.

I want to give you two things I learned from my experience.

First... I wouldn't waste the money and time to have your records expunged. Because I got sent home from several company orientations, I learned the trucking companies pay for extensive background checks. I personally witnessed people being sent home because they didn't report their expunged records. The transportation industry is dead serious about this. You will waste your money getting that stuff expunged. It can still be uncovered. They will find it. You are doing yourself a favor by sticking with your current approach.

Second... the time we are in is causing your struggle to be greater. If you can possibly get on with someone, then stay put. Establish yourself as productive, dependable, safe, and easy to work with. Those characteristics are critically important in this business. Today I can work anywhere I choose, and that's just what I'm doing. When I started, you simply wouldn't believe how much rejection I encountered.

I know this probably is discouraging, but it's straight talk from someone who has been there. You're going to have a really difficult time getting hired. There's just no getting around that. Expunged records is not a course of action that I see as helpful. Resilience and persistence are what kept me on course until I landed in pay-dirt.

Old School Yeah this is a hard one to swallow. I went looking and found that you are right and the lawyers are wrong, even if I got a pardon and had the records sealed the records would still be available for Trucking companies because of the Federalies noses being in the mix as well. I am going to see if they can get me off the Canadian list though, there is a program where I could still go into Canada regardless of my background, of course provided the Canooks decided enough time has gone by. Prime actually had a question which had I been able to say I could go to Canada I might have been looked upon in a more kindly light. ANNNYHOW, I will be taking your advice I just hope the Lawyers don't get ****ed off at me and charge me to much for getting them all excited about getting a job that would pay them well and net me nothing.

Rin B.

Michael, your post brings to mind the challenges highlighted in this article on criminal record bias in trucking: https://www.smart-trucking.com/criminal-record-bias/

It discusses how many qualified drivers are turned away due to past mistakes, even when they've demonstrably reformed. The industry is grappling with balancing safety and second chances.

Your insights on the limits of relying solely on data are valuable. Don't lose hope - some companies are starting to assess applicants individually rather than with blanket policies.

Your post was timely and helpful because I talked to a lawyer the other day and decided to try and get a Governors Pardon and get my records Expunged. Not so much because I deserve it but because have done literally everything in my power to make amends and get myself on a life course where I am not creating problems for others through my ignorance and personal problems. In short I don't blame the system, the people who created the root of my problems, nor even God. I just learned to accept reality as it is.

One of the things about reality I have found is that almost no one forgives, no one forgets and almost no one changes their own short comings especially if they are not drunks or druggies. We few actual alcoholics and drug addicts that manage to pull our selves out of the fire know things about pain guilt remorse that the intellectual elite (smarter than thou's) and the holier than thou religious do gooder's have ZERO clues about. And those are our judges. For 30 years I have been at this, and for 30 years I have managed to get by never really succeeding but surviving, learning how ignorant and foolish I was yesterday and trying to improve on it today so that maybe tomorrow wont suck azz.

I think I got off point here. The article you posted will help, has helped me to partially distil what I want to say to the Pardon board. I have never told myside of the story and did not even realize that until the lawyer said it to me and that this was the time to do so. Yeah I blew a dudes head off, nobody knew who done it, except me,(he wasn't a "good " guy). I told on myself 4 1/2 years after the fact, and the only thing I ever said when I plead guilty, was two azzholes met in the middle of the night and only one walked away. There is a lot more to telling on myself than that though. I had started my own rehabilitation before I ever decided to deal with my past actions and the "good" people made sure that part was not in the pleadings. I did not wish to make excuses or come up with some bull crap excuse, I just wanted to deal with the problem I had created for my self. So I did.

I have to spend a lot of money on a long shot, but I want to drive OTR long haul trucking only. What the Lawyer said is that if this works out and I get a pardon I literally don't have a criminal record and can legally say NO on those questions. I think that is the only way I can get into driving.

I called Western Express they will hire SAPs and give second chances to driving infractions, but the recruiter said they consider Manslaughter the same as murder and wont hire someone who has that on their record. I will be looking at May though, part of my problem is that I am in one of the great American dead zones. Wyoming is to far from everything to hire residents of said state. I am trying to do a work around on that, but as with criminal backgrounds the people making decisions want simple fill in the blank situations which don't really match reality. For instance why would it matter if my CDL is in Wyoming if I have no interest in home time and want to work OTR taking time off where ever I land at the time.

Sorry to hear that man. Have you tried Western Express or May trucking? I think you said you already tried CR England right?

Not giving up just hit a reality check wall. I expected it and I will check them out, my approach has been changed and I can see that I might be on a more difficult path than I had thought. Right now the job market is in favor of the big companies and they can be as picky as they want to be.

Part of the reason I am on this forum is to document how to get a Job as a Truck Driver the hard way lol. If it can even be done, the modern world and the reliance on "data" rather than personal interaction with people is a serious problem as far as I can tell. I am on the negative side of the data collection line.

Michael, there is a small company that provides training. It is Windy Hill Foliage in Marshfield, WI

They have a website with employment information and online application. They would be a good company to start with and you might be able to get on with them. Check them out online and give them a call at recruiting.

The thing I don’t know is how your location would work with their location, but it would be worth a phone call.

If you really want to become a driver, don’t give up yet. I believe there is a path for you, we just have to find it.

Well I got shot down by Swift too, I suspected it was going to happen, but I had a little hope for a while. Since I am out in the hinter lands, meaning nobody hires if you live in Wyoming, I am out of options for a good long time. I still have a job so I guess I was smart enough not to throw that away before I tested the waters.

Well this is just an update to my progress. Last week I got outright rejected by Prime it was funny though, some how they thought I had been in the Marine corps for over 40 years, and the recruiter called me all excited, I laughed for real on that. I told the poor fellow that it had to be a mistake that their application program was making, and the reason I knew that was because Swift had also called me and the recruiter had to walk me through the app process because it wasn't doing what it was supposed to do. (Prime and swift use the very same hiring application).

Knowing that I was able to ask him if he had read the rest of the application which he had not done, so I told him to go through it and let me know if the criminal background was on it, it was and that was the part I suspected would cause me problems and wanted to know what he thought would be the result, he didn't know or that is what he said. In short I redid the parts that were messed up, ( the 10 year work history was the problem on both the Prime app and the Swift app). and told him I would redo the errors which I did and He called me back and said I would not be considered at Prime.

Swift was still a go, as of today, the recruiter there is giving me some hope. She got me a phone interview with their security people and I answered their questions and was told I would know by today or tomorrow. So because She was upbeat about it I went to the DMV in Sundance today and blew away the CLP tests and the endorsements, the one endorsement I had NOT studied at all I ACED, doubles and Triples. That surprised me. SO regardless of how things shake out for me the part that matters for anyone who might read this is that All I did was the HIGH ROAD training program. I went through all the (permit) parts and the tanker (endorsement) part. The material in there is all a person needs to pass the Permit part of getting a CDL.

What I did was read every part and took the tests as I went, I wrote down the questions and the answers for all the ones I got wrong, and just kept going until I got everything that was required for the basic permit, General Knowledge, Combo tractor trailer, Air brakes and I did the Tanker endorsement as well. I did not bother with Hazmat because I went to Rapid City TSA office and could not get the background check started because their computer would not take my card for some reason. So if anyone asks if High Road training is enough to pass the CLP test the answer is yes if you read everything and methodically go through the whole process. It took me about 30 hours of reading and testing over the course of 3 weekends. I did go back to the beginning of the program and went back through the tests no reading, just to refresh and check how well I could remember. The design of High Road program is VERY effective. I think that in all parts of the Wyoming tests today I got less than 20 answers wrong all told. I think there were near to 150 questions all told.

Lastly I also applied at C.R.England. They have not called me back and I think that is because they no longer have the same program in place. They literally just changed the way they operate the schooling and hiring process. Their school is now a totally separate entity, anyone can go to it, it costs 3500 dollars, there is no guarantee of being hired either. The school recruiters are recruiters for the school not C.R.England. They are still affiliated though. I do not know the exact relationship but one recruiter I talked to said they could get me into the school and he told me they only go back 10 years on criminal history. That is not verified yet just something I was told by a guy who was trying to get me into the school, so there might be some B.S. in there.

Any how here is hoping I will get good news tomorrow.

Michael, I passed my test using just the High Road Training.

I did some perusing in the WI manual, but 99% was High Road.

Cool that is what I was hoping for.

In an aside Prime recruiter called me today, but apparently he did not read the whole application, and also apparently the application was as flawed as the one at Swift, (they use the same format). The poor guy thought I had been in the Marine corps since 1982. some how it didn't register my time in the national guard nor my last 10 years of work and some how just went from my Marine corps start date and skipped everything else and made my last work history entry date as the end of my Marine Corps service. I am literally laughing about that. I would have been a historical figure beating out old Archibald Henderson for longest serving Marine. But he said he would call me Monday with the results of the decision as to my worthiness as a risk. Prime does have a question in their application that asks if I got a "ministers waiver" to go into Canada though, so maybe I got a chance. I had even looked that up last week to see if there was any chance of going into Canada after all this time of good behavior. It was called something else though, and I would do it too if I could get the job. I think it is a pay to play activity on the part of Canadian lawyers though, I would have to give them a bunch of money to convince some hack of my state of rehabilitation.

I am 25% of the way through it going to take a walk and give my self a break. It seems to cover the Minnesota driver Manuel pretty well though I have only scanned through it a bit. Question: 1. Is it possible to pass a CLP test just using the High Road tutorial? Question: 2. If not what detail do I need to do in so far as reading the entire State CDL book. I am hoping to run down to the DMV in Sundance on next Friday befori I start to forget SHtuff.

Yeah Michael, I dunno what's the big deal of a laminated SS card really. I had mine since I was 12 years old, and laminated it to make it last. Getting into trucking I also had to get a new 1 plus have my name corrected. Was always called Steve,not Steven, and had that on my SS card, hence another reason I had to get a new card lol.....

Yet, here in the Phil's, when I traded my Calif license to a Filipino 1, they had all my ID's in hand, yet in the end they spelt my last name wrong, with 1 "L" not 2 duhhhh lol Also they gave me an "auto restriction" lol They didn't understand why my Calif lic, had auto restriction, no matter how much I tried to explain it, whatever.......Not like I drive daily, or get pulled over, they have NO traffic control/cops like the states.

Sounds like your journey's pickin' up steam, good luck !

It is strange in a way but not in another, government wants to keep on doing things, corporations respond with other things and the people have to deal with the out come.

Such is the world we now live in.

Michael, every journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Good luck moving forward with this.

Just to throw an idea out here, while you are footloose and fancy free, I would be willing to discuss with you the possibility of doing a ride along with me on my truck. You could really learn a lot by being a passenger. If you are interested, you would have to email me so we could establish phone contact. Then we would have to discuss this to see if it would work. Bruce

I definitely like the sound of that and while I am not quite "footloose and fancey free" yet, I will be fairly soon. I will be keeping my updates current. I got my med card yesterday, and the Swift Recruiter was on me to get the application done. It was very funny in an ironic way, I had to go through the process 3 or 4 times, and she walked me through it on the 3rd time I think it was. She was as puzzled as I was and she realized there was something wrong and it wasn't me being stupid. I think I have mentioned that computers and me are at war and they always win the first few engagements some times all of them. This time though I think I finally won. I am still not sure the application went through because I woke to an email that was much the same...finish the application. I did finish the application yesterday though and got all the signals from the computer indicating it surrendered to implacable stubbornness.

The story behind my decision to pull the trigger is fascinating, especially since I got my DOT med card yesterday. It is very involuted too. The short version is that they cancelled my surgery, sent me home with a light duty recommendation. The "good people"(read sarcasm here) said they don't want me to come back to work because they don't want to be responsible in case something goes wrong. What makes this soooo very interesting is apparently I cant go back to work without a doctors permission, which I got, yet it has to be apparently full capacity, and I had already told them after the surgery I would be on light duty for at least 4 weeks upon returning after a 2 week recovery period. I have 2 weeks of "vacation time" I was using to cover ME for the recovery time. THEY knew they were not going to let me come back to work even if the Dr. said I could but be on light duty They kept that part secret, and it would have cost me a hell of a lot. I am supposed to go talk to the two owners/bosses Monday so they can tell me what I already know they will say, ( I would bet on that), the other factor is they are also my landlords and I found out they are planning to raise the rent, and I am sure it will be in May and with a new lease agreement, they jacked my rent by 150 a year ago and I assume they will do that or more again. So in order to avoid that bind and the ensuing debt it will create should my suspicions prove true. I am trying to get myself in the wind so to speak and began the application process with companies that will hire out of Wyoming only 3 do that I have found.

So the program I have to undertake requires me to hang may ass out there in the wind with no seat. I have to go to Sheridan to get a NON laminated SSN card, that's a 3 hour drive one way and I will take care of that on Monday as well so hopefully it gets back to me before the end of April. I have to put the passport on hold, and a few other things I had in the pipeline. I should know soon if I have to abandon Wyoming and flee to Texas in order to be in a hiring area of the majority of companies. I don't have a lot of money saved and I just ****ed away 2k for something that didn't get done, but will probably still cost me even more. Things are not working out well at this point but I am 95% committed, Monday will probably make it 100%.

I have to go back to study of the High Road program so I can get the necessary prep for CLP before I depart if I have to before I am totally ready. I do have a plan B, a plan C, and D should all fall apart.

Have a good day BK I will keep you up to date.