Nevadans are…..so vain
Sunday, December 6, 2009
We wear our seatbelts. We don’t text when we drive. BUT…we do watch the cars and trucks around us. In that process, we also notice that lots of cars in Nevada have personalized (sometimes called “vanity”) license plates. Those plates may have special backgrounds or special letters and numbers….or both. And they’re often fun.
Kevin Malone, Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) Public Information Officer, tells Living Las Vegas that as of November 30, 171,784 Nevadans had personalized license plates.
The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, in its most recent survey, reports that the number of personalized license plates in Nevada, on a pro-rata basis, puts us fourth in the nation in terms of loving license plates with a message. Virginia tops the list with some 16 percent of plates being special; Nevada is in the 13 percent range, and Texas falls at the bottom of the list with less than half a percent of people choosing personalized plates.
How does a driver get a personalized plate in Nevada? By visiting the dmv website and getting all the rules and prices for personalized plates or visiting a DMV full-service office or a County Assessor’s Office. Under “Personalized Plate Search” at the website, prices and options are given for available plates. The selection is not small.
In Nevada, in addition to special license plate backgrounds for professional and volunteer firefighters, masons and veterans, other backgrounds are available celebrating specific causes and organizations. For many of the plates, a portion of the original and renewal fees go to support the sponsoring agencies such as UNLV, Missing and Exploited Children, Animal Appreciation and outreach programs for veterans and their families. Organization plates designate affiliations such as Amateur Radio Operator, Civil Air Patrol, National Guard, etc.
Truth in advertising?
Photo by Diane Taylor
Car owners wanting a special license plate background or special letters and/or numbers can even “play” at the website to see how a plate background, such as “Save Lake Tahoe”, would look or typing in their letters and/or numbers to see if their choice is still available. The LivngLV license plate letters at the top of this article were part of “play” and are still available. (Don’t all run to the DMV at once, O.K.?)
Hey Susie, your blind date is here!
Photo by Diane Taylor
Expect an initial fee of anywhere from $1 to $96 for being “special.” Renewal fees range from 0$ to $50. Special plates cannot be ordered online, though the necessary forms are available. Completed forms and the necessary payment must then be mailed or faxed to the DMV or taken to a DMV full-service office or a County Assessor’s Office.
Fees for personalization are, of course in addition to Nevada’s annual registration fees and taxes. One portion of the annual registration cost, the Governmental Services Taxes, increased as of September 1 due to a 2009 change made by the Nevada legislature in the yearly depreciation used to calculate vehicle taxes. On the other hand, another change authorized by the legislature and effective November 9, was that license plates are now available for Gold Star family members. (Plates are also available for decorated and disabled veterans.) For a fee of just $1, the immediate families and grandparents of service members killed in the line of duty are now eligible to have special plates which include the initials “FV” for Fallen Veteran.
Far from the seriousness of an “FV” plate, personalized license plates are often the subject of speculation. Who owns that car? What do the letters mean? The two plates immediately above and the gallery below (click on the photos and see the tongue-in-cheek captions) include a number of real Nevada plates. Let’s get silly, shall we?
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For nearly 25 years, I had personalized plates, mostly vehicle numbers of the trucks — Since Nevada is such a low-population, I bet I could “get” some of those old combinations again. I just might — great topic!
The general vanity plates are such a scam for the city. They charge an anual fee for the vanity plate even though the plate was only printed once and paid for. What is the surcharge for? The only thing I can come up with is to maintain the vanity plate database. Huh? There is no special fee for maintaining the database for ‘normal’ plates.
If the surcharge was going 100% to some charity or something I would support vanity plates.
Er…. you mean for the state? I don’t think any city participates in the revenue from the vanity plates and, sure it’s all about revenue-generations.
mark
Bill and I always look at the vanity plates and see if we can guess what it means, too. Sometimes I think our ideas are more clever than the license plate owner. I have a lot of great ideas for my plates but just can’t seem to part with that surcharge.
Does the charity (like “blood donor” or “keep Lake Tahoe clean”) get a percent of the fee or just the free advertising?
If you are on the DMVNV site and look at the “Personalized License Plat Application” and scroll down to the attached “Personalized License Plate Information Sheet”, you’ll see the costs and percentages going to sponsoring agencies. For example (and this is pretty typical), the Nevada Wildlife initial application costs $96 with $25 going to the sponsoring agency. Of the $50 renewal fee for that plate, $20 goes to the sponsoring agency.
Troy, the $20 annual fee for a personalized plate goes into the State Highway Fund for road construction. The Highway Fund also funds the operating budgets of NDOT and the DMV. This is separate from the charitable contributions.
Kevin,
Thanks for swinging by and providing that information — I think the personalized plate program, offered by just about every USA state, is a pretty cool governmental program. And kudos to the DMV for getting a handle on the wait times at southern Nevada DMV offices in the peak of the boom times!