…When he/she violates one of our core principles: smaller government, lower taxes, less spending or less waste–however you’d like to phrase it– Republican State Senator Ryan McDougal from Hanover did it.
The rub for me to say this is two-fold. One, I have to raise a finger (you pick) to a fellow Republican, and two (and this one is harder) I have to agree wholeheartedly with the Free Slant-Star’s editorial page.
He hit this nail on the head when he calls attention to a new $5.00 fee for using a DMV in person! Sponsored by a Republican I exclaimed to myself! Indeed it was.
Thankfully, our own Del. Mark Cole opposed this fee, in a minority (as he was in HB 3202 which was recently found to be unconstitutional), and I pray he is found to be righteously vindicated for standing up against his colleages-of-a-feather for this objection as well.
It’s just not right! Spotsylvania and Stafford are controlled by LIBERAL SPENDING DEMOCRAT BOARDS now, as will be reflected in your RAISE IN TAXES this year. A year when your home value is going DOWN and your stocks are going DOWN, and your IRA is going DOWN, and your dollar’s buying power is going WAY DOWN…. your price of food is going UP, the price of gas is going WAY UP and now your cost of county taxes is going WAY UP too!
Hey- you either voted for a liberal or you didn’t vote at all, so you have no one to blame. You didn’t volunteer with a campaign, you didn’t get your neighbors pro-actively involved, and you didn’t attend your county GOP meetings. For the 10 of you who did, I apologize. For the rest of you, you know I’m right….
Here’s the Editorial:
NEARLY HALF of the adults in Virginia have trouble reading. Could that be why at least 35 percent of us prefer to go to a DMV Service Center to renew our car registrations?
Maybe we’re old. Maybe we have difficulty understanding forms. Maybe English is a second language. Maybe we are comforted by a human presence in a call-waiting and type-your-password society that somewhere along the way made everyone’s convenience but ours supreme. Should we be charged an extra five bucks for wanting personal help renewing our tags?
That’s just what the General Assembly has decided, passing a bill by Sen. Ryan McDougle, R-Hanover, that assesses a $5 surcharge on anyone who shows up at a DMV Service Center to renew his registration instead of doing it by phone or mail or over the Internet. Call it one more step in the dehumanization of your state government.
Notably, Del. Mark Cole, R-Spotsylvania, was one of only eight House members to vote against it. Mr. Cole says he’d rather see a discount for motorists who renew online than a surcharge on those who don’t.
Indeed, there’s nothing wrong with encouraging Virginians to use other means to get their tags. More than half of us have already opted for the Internet. Of the 35 percent who go to a DMV office, some, no doubt, are procrastinators in a hurry to stay legal. But some are people who just need human assistance to get the job done. Many are poor, elderly, or foreign-born–often the very Virginians least able to absorb another $5 state fee. Call them the voiceless downtrodden. They’re easy pickings for the General Assembly, and all too often they bear the brunt of misguided “efficiencies.”
The ire over civil remedial fees seems to have taught most lawmakers nothing, but maybe the executive branch is brighter. Gov. Kaine should veto this bill and restore equity to DMV walk-ins–taxpayers who deserve equal treatment from the state workers whose salaries they pay.
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