License plate office plan creates a rift : News-Record.com : Greensboro & the Triad's most trusted source for local news and analysis

GREENSBORO — Guilford County commissioners already are sparring over a plan to open a county-owned license plate office weeks before the issue appears before the board.

The idea of the county opening a license plate office — a service for which the Department of Motor Vehicles usually uses private contractors — has been discussed by county staff for a few years.

The idea gained steam last year when a license plate agency was closed in Greensboro, creating a vacancy. The county applied for and was granted the right to open an office in October.

The Board of Commissioners must approve any such plan before it moves forward, though — and a number of commissioners said the county shouldn’t get into the license plate business.

“It’s my understanding that it’s almost always private companies or private citizens who run these offices,” said commissioners Vice Chairman Kirk Perkins . “I really don’t think Guilford County should be in the business of competing with private industry. That’s really where our tax base comes from.”

The county has two privately run license plate agencies — one on West Market Street in Greensboro and a second on Westchester Drive in High Point.

A third at Golden Gate Shopping Center was closed after an office manager and employee were charged with fraud.
The county got serious about the idea after that.

“Because of our population, the DMV would like to see three license plate offices in the county,” said Ben Chavis , the county tax director. “It’s something that we had been talking about for a while, and this seemed like the right time.”

Chavis said the time is right because of a coming change in the way vehicle taxes are collected.

“It used to be that the DMV would sell the tags and then they would tell the county, and we’d mail out the tax bills on them,” Chavis said. “People had four months to pay before we’d block their registrations.”

But as of 2013, Chavis said, license plate offices will begin collecting vehicle taxes on the state and county’s behalf when they collect the $28 license plate fee.

“We’re already in the tax collection business,” Chavis said. “We thought it made sense for us to open our own office.”

There is money to be made. The state pays each license plate office $1.43 for standard transactions such as plate renewals and $1.27 for collecting taxes on new vehicles. The offices also get $1 for transactions involving the transfer of a vehicle title.

But some commissioners said that’s not enough money to go to the trouble and expense of opening and staffing a new office. Some said that’s money better left to private contractors who will pay taxes on it anyway .

“Why does it make any sense for the county government to be beating out contractors competing for this business in our own county?” Commissioner Billy Yow said. “We’re always talking about creating jobs. We’re always asking, 'Where are the jobs coming from?’ Here we are taking jobs.”

According to the DMV, 39 private contractors competed for the contract that ultimately went to Guilford County.

Yow also has criticized the process by which the county won the contract — submitting its application late and incomplete, but still coming away with the contract after an interview with DMV officials.

Chavis said the plan that he and county Manager Brenda Jones Fox have drawn up calls for the new office to be housed in downtown’s Independence Center, where the county collects property taxes.

Chairman Melvin “Skip” Alston said he thinks the plan has merit but worries about parking for that location.

“I want to hear more about it,” Alston said. “We’re thinking outside the box on how to bring in more revenue, and I like that. We just want some more details.”

Commissioners will get those details when Chavis and Fox present their plan to the board during the work session before the meeting Thursday . The plan could be up for a vote as soon as the board’s next official meeting.

Contact Joe Killian at 373-7023 or joe.killian@news-record.com

Rolling

January 14, 2012 - 6:38 am EST

Is Billy Yow scared of a little competition? I thought private enterprise could always do things better and cheaper?

jackhartjj

January 14, 2012 - 8:51 am EST

Please explain that Rolling. I took it that Billy was saying the county should not be doing this.

Panacea

January 14, 2012 - 9:33 am EST

Rolling is saying that if private enterprise is really so much better, a county office will fail anyway, so why fuss?

buzzman

January 14, 2012 - 1:21 pm EST

If the county ends up running it, it will NOT fail. It will continue and be subsidized by the taxpayers!
Amazing that folks are so naive.

January 14, 2012 - 10:42 pm EST

Well, of course. It is a county agency performing a state role. Of course the taxpayers will pay for it if it doesn't pay for itself.

Odds are though, it will. The county will have an easier time collecting vehicle taxes, and not have to put liens on the cars of people who put off paying it.

Traveler

January 14, 2012 - 7:29 pm EST

The problem I have is that the county did not beat out the 36 or so private bids in a fair bidding process.

The Rhino ran an indepth story on this, and they usually are correct with their facts.

First, the county submitted their bid late, after the process was stated to have closed.

Second, the county's answers were incompete. Two examples: when asked where the proposed location would be, the county reportably stated something like "if we are selected, we will find a suitable place". Second, when asked to produce financials to determine that the bidder has sufficient capital, the county attached their budget.

If the county had been bidding a project, they never would have allowed such responses.

The bidding process should have been fair and transparent. It was not.

mamaboilermaker

January 14, 2012 - 7:35 am EST

The license plate agency is actually on W. Market, not W. Friendly.

Joe Killian

January 14, 2012 - 11:35 am EST

Appears we were given some bad info on that.

Have corrected it in the online story.

Dogwood

January 14, 2012 - 8:17 pm EST

I thought the High Point DMV office for license plates, title work and tag renewals was on Francis Street. The Greensboro DMV on E. Market street only does drivers license business. Parking is going to be a bummer if the county opens an office downtown. The DMV office at the tiny Guilford Shoppes Station was always packed even before Golden Gate DMV shut down. What a mess!

January 14, 2012 - 10:43 pm EST

No, it's on Westminster. I went there last year to renew my tags.

jollyroger

January 14, 2012 - 8:34 am EST

another intrusion into private business by a bankrupt govt. what's next govt grocery stores and barber shops?

goodtoknow

January 14, 2012 - 10:00 am EST

Yes, Deep Roots Market grocery store.

godfather137

January 14, 2012 - 8:47 am EST

i come from pa. and we have agencies all around the areas. to have one for Greensboro is a disgrace. after they closed corwallis st agency the one on Market st is no convenient for those of us on this side of town. i went over three times this past week andthe lines were outside and down the block. it's no wonder people are fed up. if contractors are not interested then set up state run agencies in the area.

January 14, 2012 - 8:53 am EST

Read it again, 39 folks wanted to run it, the county wound up getting it.
Jack

countryboy

January 14, 2012 - 8:57 am EST

Go to the agency in Reidsville. It's only a few minutes up the road...there is rarely a line...and they are professional and courteous.

Linus_61

January 15, 2012 - 5:06 pm EST

that's a good thing to know-the one on Market Street had no place to sit down, not that i cared about that but there were people wiht babies crying and cell phones going off even though the sign said to shut them off and the one examiner came over and told the woman to leave or else turn it off-and I got her as my examiner but she was as nice as could be-but it is still a zoo

Neither the county nor private contractors should be doing this.

The state should.

whyus

January 14, 2012 - 9:48 am EST

Normally Panacea and I don't see eye to eye on commentary as I am not a fan of government intervention, but VA DMV is state run and does a credible job vs. the corruption and inconsistency in NC operations.

EdinNC

January 14, 2012 - 9:57 am EST

Notice that the Liberals posting here are into their "Let's grow Government mode"? They can't help it - it's ingrained into their being.

January 14, 2012 - 10:05 am EST

EdinNC....I am somewhat to the right of Jesse Helms...but vehicle registration IS as function of the government.

Gso Resident

January 14, 2012 - 12:10 pm EST

I don't see how the Greensboro Farmer's Market missed this opportunity !

timflowers

January 14, 2012 - 1:25 pm EST

As long as the bidding process by the county was honest, I don't have any problem with them running a license plate office. This is one example where privately run ventures have been universally wretched. Wait times and courtesy at privatized license plate agencies are notoriously bad. If the county can do better, let them try.

However, choosing Independence Center is a mistake. There's not enough parking for the 30 to 50 extra cars that will by hunting for spaces, and many will likely drive out to the Market St. private tag office as a result.

January 14, 2012 - 1:57 pm EST

And may I add that it gets tiring reading all the anti-government posts that each article on the N&R seems to generate. May I suggest you put down your Ron Paul pamphlets and understand that the government is our government; each of us and all of us have a say in how it's run. We choose who runs it, and we help steer its path. And we all benefit from it. Putting up some imaginary, ideological wall with you on one side and "the government" on the other does nothing but create mistrust and hatred, ultimately harming our democracy.

But if you insist that all government is bad, stick to your principles and:

-- don't call the police when you're the victim of crime. (government agency)
-- don't call the fire department (government agency) when your house is ablaze. Grab a bucket instead.
-- drive yourself to the hospital during your next medical emergency rather than call the county EMS.
-- wait, you can't do that....the roads were built and are maintained by the government.
-- same for the sidewalks....you'll have to walk in private yards, if they'll grant you the right to do so.
-- stay out of restaurants, since the food safety in each is monitored by county health inspectors.
-- come to think of it, get off the internet, since it was created largely with government (military) funds.

Government is not the bad guy. Bad people in the government is the problem, but that same problem exists in private industry. Remember the reason the license plate agency is available is because of fraud by private operators. We've had two cases of this in our region in the past few months, and there is probably more of it out there that hasn't been discovered yet. That's your tax money being embezzled by crooked business owners. I haven't seen any posts on here complaining about that, though.

January 14, 2012 - 6:49 pm EST

Good thoughts Tim.....

January 14, 2012 - 7:28 pm EST

Tim, 'guvment is the bad guy! The folks out here with brains keep saying we don't need all these senseless programs and to shrink government. However it just keeps getting bigger!
To stay on topic, 39 potential contractors applied to get this tag office. As I understand it, the county went in late, and without a comlete application and got the contract. How is that right?
And have you seen ANYTHING the government does better than most private contractors?
Jack

itsjustron

January 14, 2012 - 8:30 pm EST

Yup, I have.... screw up, over charge, and lay blame.

spartan2001

January 14, 2012 - 10:16 pm EST

"And have you seen ANYTHING the government does better than most private contractors?"
Um... Not a perfect record, by far, but compared to the private sector, the gov't succeeds where the private sector fails miserably, such as:
-Monitor safety
-Provide services equitably
-Collect garbage

January 14, 2012 - 10:47 pm EST

"And have you seen ANYTHING the government does better than most private contractors?"

National defense. Law enforcement. Corrections (private prisons are hell holes worse than state or federal).

Some times government does a good job. Sometimes it doesn't.

Sometimes private enterprise does a good job, sometimes it doesn't.

For every new business that succeeds, many more fail. Most businesses fade within 3 years. The private sector thus destroys as many jobs as it creates.

I'm actually fine with free market capitalism. My problem is the big corporations have corrupted the markets, and that we tend to put capitalism up on a pedestal where it doesn't always belong.

jandrew28

January 14, 2012 - 1:50 pm EST

DMV should be handling the whole process; it's dumb to pay a contractor, whether it is Guilford County or someone else, when there are already DMV offices and employees. Plus when you move here from another state, you have to go to two different places to register your vehicles and get a state license; it's absurd and a waste of resources.

January 14, 2012 - 1:55 pm EST

Agreed. The state should open an office in the existing DMV office on S. Freeman Mill Rd at Chapman. It's accessible and convenient.

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