DMV furlough days create lines, not savings in Nev.
By David McGrath Schwartz, Las Vegas Sun
For the impatient motorists waiting in those long lines at the DMV, it might be easy to believe the situation is the inevitable result of the state’s fiscal crisis and budget cuts.
But no. Instead, it’s a by-product of furloughs of state workers elsewhere in the Nevada government and what some might say is a misguided sense of fairness. Department of Motor Vehicles workers, as well as those processing unemployment claims and welfare, have gotten dragged into furloughs in the name of equity, lawmakers say.
Forcing state DMV workers to take off one day a month — and creating longer lines in the process — does nothing to remedy the state’s general fund budget deficit.
But it has forced Nevadans to spend drastically more time tapping their toes in line. In the two years state workers have been forced to take furloughs, average wait times at DMV offices have increased by as much as 67 percent.
