Inside This Issue...

On Friday, Jan. 11, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) unveiled the final Real ID Rules in a press conference in Washington, D.C. In response, AAMVA issued a joint press release with the National Governors Association and the National Conference of State Legislatures. "Through an extensive process, our membership used their technical expertise in issuing drivers’ licenses to provide DHS with a broad range of concerns and suggestions," said Neil D. Schuster, AAMVA president and CEO. "We are encouraged that the agency took these into account when crafting the final rule. We will conduct an in-depth analysis of the final rule to provide the best possible information and assistance to our members." The three national organizations plan to continue to review the rule and meet with state stakeholders to determine the impact of the regulations. The entire press release is available in the Press Room on AAMVA's Web site.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) proposes to revise the standards for mandatory training requirements for entry-level operators of commercial motor vehicles (CMVs) in interstate operations who are required to possess a commercial driver’s license (CDL). The proposed rule would not apply to drivers who currently possess a CDL or obtain a CDL before a date three years after a final rule goes into effect. Following that date, persons applying for new or upgraded CDLs would be required to successfully complete specified minimum classroom and behind-the-wheel training from an accredited institution or program. The state driver licensing agency would only issue a CDL if the applicant presented a valid Driver Training Certificate obtained from an accredited institution or program. This Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) would strengthen the agency’s entry-level driver training requirements as a means to enhance the safety of CMV operations on our nation’s highways. Comments must be received on or before March 25, 2008. View the Federal Register notice for more details. A press release is also available on the FMCSA Web site. Please send a copy of your comments to Kevin Lewis, Vice President, Driver Programs, or to Pamela Walker, Senior Director, Federal Government Affairs.

The Wisconsin Department of Transportation, Division of Motor Vehicles (DMV), is seeking a contractor to operate an on-board diagnostic (OBDII) only vehicle inspection and maintenance (I/M) program in seven Wisconsin counties on the State's behalf. The closing date for the request for proposal (RFP) is Feb. 21, 2008 at 2:00 p.m. (Central Standard Time). View the RFP document for more information. More RFP's are listed on AAMVA's Web site in the "Grants/RFPs/RFIs" section.

House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security on Jan. 11, 2008 expressing his concerns that more time is needed to "produce a fiscally responsible and effective rule that does not impinge upon the privacy of Americans." Thompson stated that "with a total cost of almost $10 billion dollars, the Final Rule still presents a monumental expense to states and individuals over the next several years." Thompson iterated that the verification requirements imposed on states are premature and that many of the federal databases that the states use to authenticate documents are "incomplete, unreliable, and in dire need of significant enhancements." The entire letter is available for download on the House Homeland Security Committee Web site.

The National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission will release its Report to Congress on Tuesday, Jan. 15, 2008 at 10 a.m. at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The Report will be posted on the Commission's Web site at 11 a.m. EST that day. Copies of the news release will be available in the News Room section of the Web site (www.transportationfortomorrow.org).

The Election Assistance Commission (EAC) has scheduled its next public meeting for Thursday, Jan. 17 in Washington, DC. The meeting will include briefings on the following: FY2008 Appropriations; EAC Standards Board, EAC Board of Advisors; EAC Technical Development Guidelines Committee; Election Data Collection Grant Program. Commissioners will consider and vote on the following: Changes to the National Voter Registration Form; Disclaimer Proposal to State Instructions Portion of the NVRA Form; EAC Organizational Chart. EAC will install new Officers for 2008. The Commission will consider other administrative matters. For more information, visit http://www.eac.gov/News/meetings/january-17-2008-public-meeting

For the first time ever, the White House will release an E-Budget on Feb. 4 and will not order hard copy versions of the document. The fully searchable Fiscal 2009 E-Budget will be available for downloading online at www.budget.gov. With an estimated total of nearly 2,200 pages in the four-book budget set, and a projected order of more than 3,000 copies for the media, Capitol Hill and the White House, the E-Budget will have a “green” focus above and beyond the fiscal sense. This step will save nearly 20 tons of paper, or roughly 480 trees. In terms of fiscal savings, the E-Budget is estimated to save nearly a million dollars over the next five years. Paper copies of the FY09 Budget can still be ordered from the Government Printing Office at www.gpo.gov.

In August 2006, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) published a final rule specifying uniform requirements for the accuracy, collection, storage, survivability, and retrievability of onboard motor vehicle crash event data in passenger cars and other light vehicles voluntarily equipped with event data recorders (EDRs). The final rule was intended to standardize the data collected through EDRs so that it could be put to the most effective future use. NHTSA posted its responses to several petitions for reconsideration of the August 2006 rule in the Jan. 14, 2007 Federal Register (73 FR 2168). After considering the issues raised, the agency is granting some aspects of the petitions, and denying some aspects. The amendments in this rule are effective March 14, 2008. View the entire notice online for more details.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is seeking approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for proposed collections of information on the Highway Safety Program Cost Summary, and on the Occupant Protection Incentive Grant. The Highway Safety Plan identifies State’s traffic safety problems and describes the program and projects to address those problems. In order to account for funds expended, States are required to submit a HS-217 Highway Safety Program Cost Summary. The Program Cost Summary is completed to reflect the state’s proposed allocations of funds (including carry-forward funds) by program area, based on the projects and activities identified in the Highway Safety Plan. An Occupant Protection Incentive Grant (23 CFR, part 1345, Occupant Protection Incentive Grant—Section 405) is available to states that can demonstrate compliance with at least four of six criteria. Demonstration of compliance requires submission of copies of relevant seat belt and child passenger protection statutes, plan and/or reports on statewide seatbelt enforcement and child seat education programs and possibly some traffic court records. View the Federal Register notice for details on both of these proposed collections of information and instructions on how to submit comments. Comments must be received on or before March 10, 2008.

In January 2008, the Washington State Department of Licensing will begin issuing a new Enhanced Driver's License and Identification card (EDL/ID). The EDL/ID provides travelers with a low cost, convenient alternate travel document to a passport for entry at land and sea ports between the U.S. and Canada, Mexico, Bermuda and the Caribbean. The EDL/ID has similar security features to a U.S. passport, such as embedded Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and a Machine Readable Zone (MRZ). The RFID is required by the federal government to facilitate rapid identification checks at the border. The MRZ can be scanned when the RFID reader is not available at the border crossing station. The RFID tag will only have a unique reference number and will not contain personal information about the applicant. Washington State is first in the nation to create a viable solution to the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI), requiring people traveling into the U.S. to present a valid passport. The requirement for air travel went into effect in January 2007, and for land and sea border crossing, the passport requirement will start in early 2008. The EDL/ID is designed to improve security and facilitate border management to address the WHTI requirements and maintain trade and tourism across our borders. More information about the EDL/ID program is available on the Washington State Department of Licensing Web site or by calling (360) 902-3611.

The Unified Carrier Registration (UCR) Board will meet in Clearwater, Florida on Monday, Jan. 14, 2008, from 1:15 p.m. until 5:30 p.m. EST, and Tuesday, January 15, 2008, from 8:00 a.m. until 12:00 noon EST.  For those of you who are unable to attend in person, a telephone bridge will be available on both days. The toll-free number to call on both days is: 1-888-455-9639 and the PASSCODE for both days is: 65596. A proposed agenda and other supplemental information is available on AAMVA's Web site at www.aamva.org/KnowledgeCenter/Vehicle/MotorCarriers/

If you haven’t already done so, please respond to the following surveys:

• Arizona – CDL Expired Physical Notification (Ends 01/18/2008)
• Florida – Driver Cell Phone Use (Ends 01/15/2008)
• Pennsylvania – Proximity Sensors (Ends 01/14/2008)
• Maine – Daylight Headlight Use (Ends 01/22/2008)
• California – Employee Satisfaction Survey (Ends 01/16/2008)
• Ohio – Mail In Registration Services (Ends 01/14/2008)
• Nevada – Out-of-State Titles with Incorrect VINs (Ends 01/22/2008)

As a reminder to all users of the Commercial Driver's License Information System (CDLIS) application, new data introduced to CDLIS on or after Jan. 1, 2008 must adhere to CDLIS 4.1.0 specification requirements. Each jurisdiction must ensure all information it sends outbound with a citation effective date or withdrawal effective date of Jan. 1, 2008 and later be valid. Beginning Feb. 17, 2008, AAMVA will be supplying many of the necessary data validation checks on behalf of the jurisdictions in production. The AAMVA-provided validations will be made available to jurisdictions for testing purposes beginning Jan. 21, 2008. If interested in conducting casual testing with AAMVA, contact the AAMVA Help Desk at helpdesk@aamva.org to schedule your testing. In support of providing the necessary data validation checks, AAMVA has provided jurisdictions with the choice of two notification approaches, when acting as the State of Inquiry. A detailed description of each option will be distributed to jurisdictions via e-mail. Jurisdictions must provide their choice of notification approach to AAMVA no later than Jan. 21, 2008. Please direct any questions or concerns to the attention of Nancy Carlson via e-mail or at (703) 908-2818.

AAMVA is now accepting applications for its AAMVA/Nick Denice Memorial Fellowship Awards at the John F. Kennedy School of Government's Senior Executives in State and Local Government Program at Harvard University. This award is open to AAMVA members who are chief motor vehicle and law enforcement officials from the United States and Canada; AAMVA or IRP, Inc. Board of Directors members and AAMVA International Standing Committee Chairs and Vice Chairs. Read about the experience of last year's recipient, Col. Jeffrey Miller, Pennsylvania. Don't miss the application deadline of Feb. 7, 2008.

Then it was probably AAMVA's fault. Mea culpa. You see most, if not all, state motor vehicle agencies, use AAMVA's private and secure network (AAMVAnet™) to process customer transactions. To put this into perspective for you, AAMVAnet™ processes approximately 3 million DMV transactions per day, and, since going live in 1996, has had no outages! I'm no tech expert, but I am not sure that any network service provider can boast that record. And AAMVAnet™ processes 99 percent of transactions in 0.1 second. That's faster than you can say DMV. Read the entire blog:  http://blog.aamva.org/2008/01/09/couldnt-do-business-with-dmv-on-monday.aspx