Discussion continued to swirl this week around ride-for-hire companies like Uber and Lyft, after a bill unveiled last Friday proposed regulations for the industry, including two-step background checks, that advocates for stricter oversight say do not go far enough.

The House Financial Services Committee, chaired by Rep. Aaron Michlewitz, offered up legislation that would establish a new state division to monitor so-called TNCs (transportation network companies) like Uber and Lyft.

The regulations would require drivers to pass background checks conducted by the companies and the state and submit to twice-yearly inspections of their vehicles. Vehicles transporting passengers through mobile-app-facilitated platforms would have to display state-issued decals rather than specialized livery plates.

In other instances, higher fares meant to incentivize drivers during  periods of high demand, known as surge pricing, would be prohibited during weather emergencies, and ride-for-hire drivers could not pick up fares at cab stands or at Logan Airport nor solicit street pick-ups. Officials anticipate pushback on proposed company-carried insurance requirements, such as a $1 million policy covering a driver from the acceptance of a fare through drop-off.

In a statement, Uber Boston General Manager Chris Taylor said the company is “grateful for the thoughtfulness and diligence” of the Financial Services Committee in drafting the regulations. “We have questions and concerns about language in this bill that we are raising with the Legislature,” he said. “We want to ensure that riders, drivers, regulators, Uber, and other TNCs will still be able to use innovative new technology to deliver more people to more places safely and reliably.”

Central to the discussion is Uber’s identification of itself as a technology company, not a transportation company, as it links potential drivers with potential passengers through a mobile app platform. Critics of the services have dismissed that characterization out of hand, although the company asserts that fully half of its drivers are working ten hours or less a week and part-time drivers would be discouraged from signing up due to the extensive regulatory hurdles.

Fingerprinting drivers, which is not mandated in the legislative proposal, is a flash-point in these discussions. Boston has started fingerprinting cab drivers, and Uber has objected to the process.

Company officials say that the screenings in place are thorough and reveal only potentially relevant information on their drivers, while fingerprinting could bring to light arrests that led to no charges or convictions. Such checks would limit the options of potential drivers from demographics with disproportionately high rates of arrests, regardless of their conviction records, the company noted.

Boston Police Commissioner William Evans has pushed for the fingerprinting requirement, as have other law enforcement officials from across the state.

Scott Solombrino, president of Boston Coach and a spokesman for The Ride Safe Massachusetts Coalition, said his group is disappointed with the current proposal. “We truly believe that the bill can be improved,” he told the Reporter, ideally, he said, by combining “full-blown background checks” with fingerprinting. “We’ve come to the conclusion that this is the only safe way for these people to operate in the market. We, as the chauffeured car industry, are doing it voluntarily and asking the state to make it a mandatory requirement.”

Areas of Boston like Dorchester and Mattapan have seen a surge in Uber use in the four years since the service set up operations in the commonwealth. Uber officials say ride-for-hire services offer riders more options and faster response times in under-served neighborhoods.

According to the city’s 2013 Taxi Consultant Report, taxi dispatch responses in Dorchester and Mattapan lagged significantly below the rest of the city, with a 52 percent response rate in Mattapan and between 59 and 63 percent in Dorchester. Uber notes a 96 to 97 percent rate of calls that turned into completed trips in those same neighborhoods.

From 2012 to today, Uber said, wait times in Dorchester have dropped by two-thirds and now average under four minutes. The 2013 report found that fewer than 75 percent of taxi pick-ups in Dorchester arrived in under 20 minutes, as compared with more than 99 percent of Uber trips.

Ride-for-hire services have plugged gaps in many riders’ moves from and between T stations. Coinciding with the imminent cancellation of late night MBTA service, Uber has announced a $5 fare cap that would be enacted for its uberPOOL service along T subway lines during late night hours for four weekends starting on March 19.

State Senators Linda Dorcena Forry and Sonia Chang-Diaz, along with Diana Hwang, who is running for the vacant Senate seat in East Boston, have called for the MBTA’s Fiscal Management Control Board to delay the planned suspension of late night service. Late night service on Friday and Saturday nights was set up in 2014 and is due to be cancelled on March 18.

Federal officials said last week that the MBTA had failed to follow civil rights guidelines requireing the agency to fully examine the impact of cancelling late-night service on minorities and low-income riders. Taken in conjunction with an MBTA vote to enact substantial fare hikes, the loss of late-night service was poised to strike a disproportionate blow to those communities, said Forry, Chang-Diaz, and Hwang in calling for the delay.

“I believe the equity analysis will show what we already know, that the suspension of late-night service will disproportionately impact low income riders,” said Forry in a statement. “Late-night service is not a luxury for many people in my district.  It is unfortunate that the fiscal control board would move to end this valuable service without first completing the equity analysis required by federal civil rights guidelines.”