California’s Department of Motor Vehicles in 2020 is looking to turn the page on a turbulent past couple of years that were highlighted by network outages, long wait times and voter registration errors.
In his first week in office, Gov. Gavin Newsom deployed a so-called “strike team” to improve the department and later called for “re-imagining the DMV” during his first State of the State Address. He hired a new director for the department and demand the DMV begin accepting credit card payments at its offices.
While the DMV has substantially cut its wait times from its highs during the summer of 2018, some fear a return to lengthy delays because millions of additional customers are expected to pour into offices to acquire a REAL ID card. The new license will be required by Oct. 1, 2020, to board airplanes or enter other federal facilities without a passport.
As the DMV prepares itself for a consequential year, here’s how the Newsom administration can tell if its plan to fix the DMV is working:
Real ID cards are issued quickly
Issuing REAL ID cards is perhaps the biggest priority for the DMV in 2020. The department has given a total of 7 million Real ID cards to 6.3 million Californians since launching the program in January 2018.
REAL ID helped fuel long lines across the state during the summer of 2018, and there’s reason to be concerned about a return to those levels, given the volume of people who have yet to come in for the card.
More than 21 million Californians are still eligible for the card and the DMV expects 10 million to come in for one before the Oct. 1, 2020 deadline.
The department has already trimmed REAL ID processing times in half and is working to make sure technicians can get people in and out of offices even faster. Customers wanting a REAL ID card need to show a proof of identity, proof of a Social Security number and two proofs of residency.
Have fewer outages
Former DMV Director Jean Shiomoto told lawmakers in August 2018 that she agreed with the characterization of the department’s technology as a “40-year-old dinosaur” and Newsom has described the technology as “Byzantine.”
For years, the DMV’s outdated technology has frustrated workers, as well as the customers trying to get in and out of their offices.
Between January 2017 and mid-August 2018, the DMV experienced 34 IT outages, including six statewide office system outages ranging anywhere from 15 minutes to nine hours. Upon lawmakers’ request, the DMV has since provided monthly reports describing technological issues.
Its latest report highlighted five tech failures in October, including a four-hour network connectivity delay in four DMV offices. Outages have been fewer and further between in recent months, and the DMV recently awarded a four-year contract to Comcast valued at $24 million to swap out its existing network.
DMV Director Steve Gordon called the department’s technology “alarming,” but is confident his 18 years experience at Cisco will help him improve the DMV’s IT infrastructure.
“The DMV’s 2020 goals include successful implementation of REAL ID — making sure those Californians who want one can get one — and continued technological upgrades that lead to improved customer experiences,” the DMV said, noting that more tech improvements “are on the way.”
Last January, Newsom demanded the DMV begin accepting credit cards by the end of the year. On Sept. 30, a credit card pilot launched in Davis. It was then expanded to Roseville, Fresno and Victorville in October.
“DMV anticipates credit cards will be accepted in field offices statewide by mid to late 2020,” the department said.
Wait times hold steady
The DMV has set a goal to have customers with appointments wait no longer than 15 minutes and customers without appointments wait in line no more than 45 minutes.
The department’s latest report to lawmakers shows the DMV is hitting those targets, with a statewide average wait time of 14 minutes for customers with appointments and 33 minutes for those without them.
Still, there are tremendous differences by region, with the Los Angeles area experiencing the lengthiest delays and exceeding the DMV’s 15-minute and 45-minute targets.
The DMV is following recommendations outlined in a March Department of Finance audit to make sure workers show up on time and make more windows open to customers.
The DMV has also expanded business hours to leave dozens of offices open on Saturday in an effort to bring down its wait times.
With the REAL ID deadline approaching, Newsom and state officials will closely monitor wait time data to see if the department’s new practices are working.
“Going to the DMV has, for too long, been a SLOW, time-consuming experience. We’re working hard to fix that,” Newsom boasted on Twitter earlier this month. “In the last year, we have cut delays nearly in half.”
No more voter registration errors
Since California launched the Motor Voter program in April 2018 to automatically register eligible voters at the DMV, the Secretary of State’s Office has seen 105,000 mistakes occur.
Among the errors were six Californians who shouldn’t have been registered voting in the 2018 midterms due to “DMV errors,” an unusual uptick in the number of no party preference voters and hundreds of Californians who unknowingly had their party affiliation changed.
The DMV does not anticipate additional registration errors occurring ahead of the March 3, 2020, primary because of additional safeguards it has put in place with the Secretary of State’s Office to help fix a confusing prompt.
When Motor Voter launched in April 2018, a screen asked voters to either select a political party or click a button saying, “I do not wish to choose a political party.” Those who either skipped the question or decided not to choose a party were defaulted to no party preference, even if they had previously been registered with a political party.
While the crux of the issue of people being unwittingly switched out of their existing party appears to have been resolved, there still remains a high level of concern and confusion surrounding the Motor Voter program.
State Sen. Patricia Bates, R-Laguna Niguel, is pushing a bill to require Californians to opt in to vote at the DMV instead of being automatically registered.
“The DMV is already dealing with many other problems and having people question the integrity of our election system should not be one of them,” Bates said in a statement.
The DMV has received about 14 million voter registration transactions since April 2018 and said it will “work closely with the Secretary of State’s office to ensure the integrity of the New Motor Voter program, improve the system and respond to program needs.”
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