The Alaska Division of Motor Vehicles is evaluating whether to remove the month and dates registration stickers that decorate state license plates on these.
In an information request that was released earlier this month the division issued an open request for information to questions about the advantages and disadvantages of the concept.
The agency, via an official spokesperson, stated that it doesn’t have any information to talk regarding the request as of now however, it’s one of the many requests the department is currently putting put out.
“This is the DMV investigating and trying to understand the world,” said Ken Truitt who is a representative of the Department of Administration, which oversees the DMV.
Public notices indicate that the DMV is also looking into possible self-service kiosks “in highly-trafficked areas,” a mobile application that permits Alaskans to renew their licenses and registration online, as well as chatbots that use artificial intelligence to respond to questions by the DMV.
“DMV is currently putting five RFIs open and is attempting to understand the available options to aid in helping DMV modernize and be more technologically-oriented,” Truitt said.
The move follows The DMV’s move to change the standard license plate to incorporate the new font, and the legislature’s vote to remove the requirement that all vehicles be equipped with 2 license plates. Only one front license plate mandatory.
At least three states have removed registration plates that be adorned with labels that show the expiration date for the registration of a vehicle.
New Jersey eliminated the requirement in 2004, and was followed with Connecticut in 2010, and Pennsylvania in 2016. The majority of states require cars to be registered every few years -but there’s no physical proof that their registration is current.
There are lessons to be learned to Alaska by learning from the experience of Pennsylvania.
When Pennsylvania removed its stickering program the State’s Department of Transportation claimed it could cut $3.1 million annually in administrative costs.
Three years after, a state legislator was able to propose a reintroduction of the sticker requirement and pointing out that the number of cars registered in the state dropped following the removal of the requirement.
The decline in registrationslikely due to people avoiding the licensing requirements resulted in $22 million of fees for 2017. This was just in 2017, the legislator said.
In the next legislative hearing at a subsequent legislative hearing, a state official said that the decrease in registrations was due to the normal fluctuation.
An official from the state police has testified that due to the new policy, police officers started running registration plates on the database of registrations for the state and thereby increasing the number of citations issued for vehicles that were not registered.
The bill for reinstatement of stickers failed in Pennsylvania and the state continues to operate with no license plates.
The story first appeared in Alaska Beacon and is republished here with permission.
