November 26, 2007
By Rex Springston
Richmond Times-Dispatch, Va.
With the help of B DANCIN and many others, WERNO1.
Virginia has the highest percentage of personalized, or vanity, license plates in the country, a first-of-its-kind survey shows.
"Virginia is for vanity-plate lovers," said Jason King, a spokesman for the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators.
WHO SEZ
The survey was conducted largely by King's group, an association of state motor-vehicle departments.
The research showed that 16 percent of Virginia's plates bear the oft-cryptic vanity messages, followed by New Hampshire with 14 percent.
WHY VA
Virginia's love of the plates is no surprise to anyone who has spent any time on the road with RCAR, MELLO1 and PINT SZE.
But no one truly knows why Virginia stands in the vanguard of vanity.
It could be that Virginia charges only $10 a year, one of the lowest fees in the country. But other states also offer inexpensive plates. New Mexico, for example, charges just $17, but only 1.7 percent of its plates are personalized.
On the other hand, Illinois has a high fee -- $94 the first year, $13 each year after that -- but is third in the state rankings at 13.4 percent.
Virginia's vanity-plate sales brought in about $9.4 million last year. The money is used to run the vanity-plate program.
1STORY
Since both her names start with "b" and she likes to be dancing, it was only natural that Blakely Booth would choose B DANCIN.
"My license plate says it all, I guess," said Booth, 24, who grew up in Prince George County and attends Virginia Commonwealth University. She has danced professionally since she was 16.
HER VU
You could make a good guess at B DANCIN, but RUNRNME?
That would be the plate of Shelia Anderson of Richmond, who has run marathons and other races since the mid-1980s.
"No matter if I'm actively running or not, there is always a runner in me trying to get out," said Anderson, 50, a program analyst with the state Department of Criminal Justice Services.
BOOK GY
Stefan Lonce of Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y., is the author of the upcoming book "LCNS2ROM -- License to Roam: Vanity License Plates and the Stories They Tell." He calls the plates "minimalist poetry in motion."
"You can tell a story -- be it a powerful story, a personal story, a funny story -- in eight characters or less as you are driving to work in the morning. Isn't that great?"
Lonce worked with the vehicles association on the survey after he found no one knew how many vanity plates existed.
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