DPS owed $620 million in unpaid surcharges

A lot of people owe a lot of money to DPS.

More than 750,000 Texans are driving without valid licenses because they haven't paid stiff annual penalties -- as much as $2,000 for three years -- added to various traffic violations in 2004.

The state has nearly $620 million in uncollected surcharges on convictions that include driving while intoxicated, failure to provide insurance and having an invalid license, according to figures compiled by the Texas Department of Public Safety and provided to the Dallas Morning News.

The surcharges are part of the Texas Driver Responsibility Program, which was approved by the Legislature and implemented in September 2004 by DPS. The money is earmarked for trauma care.

The biggest fees are for DWI: $1,000 a year for three years for the first conviction, $1,500 a year for the second and $2,000 a year for any conviction with a blood-alcohol content at least twice the legal limit (0.16 or greater). Those caught without insurance or with an invalid license are supposed to pay $250 per year for three years.

The idea was to levy hefty fines for certain violations to discourage those types of offenses and raise funding for pressing needs. But just 32 percent of the surcharges have been collected.

"There are a number of reasons why people don't comply with the law, but personal finances is probably the main reason," DPS spokeswoman Tela Mange said. "Many drivers just don't have the money. Paying $1,000 a year for three years is a lot of money for some people."

We've talked about this before. It's not just that the punishment doesn't fit the crime. It's mainly that the whole purpose behind these surcharges is so misguided.

Sen. Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, who sponsored the legislation, and other lawmakers wonder whether the penalties are so high that they actually provide an incentive for people not to pay. But the Legislature didn't reduce the fees in its latest session, leaving it to DPS to devise ways to improve the collection rate.

"If we could only collect all the fines and fees the state is owed, we could cut taxes because we would have a lot more money than we have now," said Ogden, also noting that the unpaid surcharges haven't been a problem for the state budget because collections of sales taxes and other state taxes are higher.

Hey, if we raised those fees a little more and improved the collection rate, we could stop levying taxes altogether. Does it make sense to fund the budget like that? There's no suggestion that these surcharges improve public safety. The sole reason for them, plainly stated by members of the Legislature, is financial. So where's the anti-red-light-camera outrage squad on this? The argument for the cameras is far stronger than it is for this, and no one is in danger of getting tossed in jail for failing to pay to pay a red light camera fine. Yet if you listen closely, you can hear the crickets chirp. I guess not all "revenue grabs" are created equal.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on October 15, 2007 to Crime and Punishment