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Blackouts hampering renewals of driver’s licenses, car registrations
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Posted on Sep 10 2008
The constant outages are a big concern at the Department of Public Safety’s Bureau of Motor Vehicle, as they affect the bureau’s ability to process documents in a timely manner.
According to acting DPS Commissioner Capt. Dolores San Nicolas, the frequent blackouts are impacting BMV’s operations, where it is very important for services to be done immediately such as the renewal of driver’s licenses and vehicle registrations.
“It is a concern that we cannot extend a written notice to insurance companies or any other related private companies that deal with driver’s license issue and identification,” she pointed out.
“It does hamper our operation a lot based on expiration of driver’s license and registration cards for vehicles. Those are enforcement issues that [customers] bring up,” she said.
San Nicolas said that monitoring traffic lights is also causing overtimes, while the renewal and registration for cars are being messed up.
The police official said it would be helpful if the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. would schedule its rotating outages schedule to give the bureau enough time to get things done.
“Probably, CUC could give DPS at least four hours in the morning to do our services,” San Nicolas said. “Then they can shut off [the power] anytime in the afternoon. The public could then be informed that they can come in the morning instead of the afternoon,” she said.
San Nicolas said they are now trying to get a temporary generator for the bureau.
“We are trying to examine that, except our budget is not adequate,” she said, adding that it will cost more than $12,000 to get a new generator that will accommodate BMV. She said the cost does not include the expenses for the generator’s installation and manpower to watch it.
San Nicolas said the department’s plan to purchase a generator came up when the power situation deteriorated, affecting BMV’s eight-hour operation.
“But now it [power supply] is coming back; at least it is giving us six to eight hours of power sometimes, “she said.
