Real ID and the States

January 23, 2006

http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060123/BUSINESS/60

1230305/1003

National uniform driver’s license law ‘nightmare’ for states by Brian Bergstein, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

published January 23, 2006 6:00 am

An anti-terrorism law creating a national standard for all driver’s licenses by 2008 isn’t just upsetting civil libertarians and immigration rights

activists.

State motor vehicle officials nationwide who will have to carry out the Real ID Act say its authors grossly underestimated its logistical, technological

and financial demands.

In a comprehensive survey obtained by The Associated Press and in follow-up interviews, officials cast doubt on the states’ ability to comply with the

law on time and fretted that it will be a budget buster.

“It is just flat out impossible and unrealistic to meet the prescriptive provisions of this law by 2008,” said Betty Serian, a deputy secretary of

the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.

Nebraska’s motor vehicles director, responding to the survey by the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, said to comply with Real ID her state “may have to consider extreme measures and possibly a complete reorganization.”

And a new record-sharing provision of Real ID was described by an Illinois

official as “a nightmare for all states.”

For the rest of the story, check out the link above.