Implementation Guidelines - Federal Transit Administration - U.S. ...

Whomever you select to provide your
training, you should ensure that the
instructor will adhere to your outline and
provide the training supportive of your
policy and programs. Although a trainer
may have an off-the-shelf curriculum, that
curriculum will be of little use if it does not
meet the requirements of the regulations or
of your system. At a minimum, the
curriculum will need to be tailored to reflect
the provisions of your policy and
procedures, your discipline policy, and your
EAP, if any. For this reason, you may want
to have someone from your human
resources, medical, or labor relations
department work with the outside expert in
developing and presenting the training
sessions.
Important criteria to consider in
selecting a trainer are:
• Workplace experience with transit or
similar industries;
• Concern with safety, cost reduction,
productivity, liability, and public
image, as well as employee welfare;
• Understanding of the applicable FTA
and DOT regulations and how to
handle employee attitudes and
concerns regarding drug and alcohol
testing;
• Training style, platform skills,
techniques, tools, and methods
appropriate to adult learning,
including appropriate and highquality
audio/visual material,
handouts, role playing, and case
studies;
• Willingness to learn about your
transit system, its operations, policy,
programs, values, and culture; and
• Flexibility, professionalism, and tact
in handling diverse opinions and
needs of resistant employees,
assertive managers, supervisors,
executives, and union
representatives.
FTA sponsored the production of a
training aid for transit supervisors that
describes the signs and symptoms of
prohibited drug use. This training program,
entitled “Identification of Drug Abuse
and/or Alcohol Misuse in the Workplace:
An Interactive Training Program,”
demonstrates the manifestation and
behavioral cues of drug use and alcohol
misuse, and the procedures supervisors
should use to make fair and reliable
reasonable suspicion testing referrals. A
copy of this training program including
video and leader’s guide can be obtained by
faxing a request to the FTA Office of Safety
and Security at (202) 366-7951.
Section 5. DRUG-FREE
WORKPLACE ACT TRAINING
Provisions of the FTA regulation affect
only covered safety-sensitive employees.
You are not required to test or to train any
employees who are not safety-sensitive.
However, the Drug-Free Workplace Act
(DFWA) requires that all direct recipients of
$25,000 or more in federal funds institute an
ongoing substance abuse awareness
program. The act requires that efforts be
made to ensure that the drug-free message is
ever present in the workplace, and it extends
to all employees of a covered organization
not just those who are deemed safetysensitive.
For this reason, you may wish to train
your entire workforce on the importance of
maintaining a drug-free workplace, and on
the resources that you have available to help
Chapter 5. Training 5-7 August 2002