Residents of Clearlake have a valid complaint, regarding the state of services the community receives from the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Currently, the DMV has only seen fit to provide Clearlake and the southern Lake County area with a satellite office that is open for business just 6 ? hours per week, on Thursdays.
We have to agree with Operation DMV organizer, Melinda Young, that the current DMV services situation in Lake County just doesn”t make sense. U.S. Census data pegs Clearlake”s population at 14,890 and Lakeport”s at 5,135. Lakeport has a fully functioning DMV office, albeit it is operating with a schedule that is not as full as it was before additional actions were taken to reduce state expense levels. The point being that if Lakeport can sustain a full-blown DMV office, it would certainly seem logical that Clearlake, with 2.9 times the population, should be supplied with a full time DMV office, too. A one-day-a-week satellite office is just not sufficient to handle the needs of the population.
Young formed Operation DMV in October of last year to call attention to the south county”s service slight from the DMV. The group has gotten its point across to the DMV administration, as well as state political officials. So far, the organization has been informed that the service level at the Clearlake satellite office has been improved by the addition of an extra employee, faster computers and an ATM/debit device. Those upgrades would make DMV users happy, if the office was open all week. But, since it is still operating less than one full day per week, the enhancements are just window dressing.
We all know the state is broke. We assume that, more than anything else, the budget crunch is the reason why Clearlake has not been provided a full-time DMV office. Automobile registration fees were just increased from .65 percent of an auto”s value to 1.15 percent. Under normal circumstances, a 77 percent increase in automobile registration fees would allow the state to afford a fully-operational DMV office in Clearlake. Since nothing seems normal right now, who knows what will happen. The fact remains that south county residents deserve a full time DMV office located in Clearlake.
