Audit: RMV issued 1.9G licenses to dead people
More than 10,000 disability placards also questioned; gov pushes back
A scathing audit that found the Registry of Motor Vehicles had issued thousands of driver’s licenses and handicap parking placards to dead people prompted a strong denial from Gov. Charlie Baker, who found fault with the review.
“Everybody on that list is alive,” Baker said, dismissing the findings and offering no explanation for how Auditor Suzanne Bump’s team found the registry issued 1,905 licenses to people who were listed at the time as deceased in the federal Social Security Administration Death Master File.
The RMV audit released yesterday also tallied 10,145 requests for disability placards made by people also listed in the master file as mortally expired.
Bump hammered the “significant public safety risk” of letting individuals get licenses in the names of deceased people.
“Fixing this problem must be a top priority for the RMV,” the auditor said in a statement.
In both cases, Bump pointed to the fact that the registry seemed to not consult the Social Security list when issuing the licenses and placards, though that fact was also disputed by the RMV.
Nearly all the licenses were still active at the time of the audit, the report said, and 36 had been referred to state police for investigation.
The audit calls for additional oversight in the issuance of disability parking placards, such as requiring permanent holders of the placards to reapply every five years and generally improve its processes for issuing the permits. The abuse of the placards leads to loss of local parking funds and deprives disabled people of available parking.
The handicap placards give people the ability to park in any public spot they wish and not pay parking fees.
Bump says her office has repeatedly found state agencies failing to remove dead people from program rolls, citing a 2013 Department of Transitional Assistance audit showing $2 million in benefits paid to dead people and a 2016 audit of the Massachusetts State Retirement Board paying $687,000 to dead pensioners.
The RMV responded to the audit claiming it had used the federal Social Security Administration death file when issuing the disability permits and the driver’s licenses, and it assured auditors that its new licensing software system — which replaces a 30-year-old system — makes use of the federal records.
Registry spokeswoman Jacqueline Goddard said her office “rejects the findings in the Auditor’s report, especially the false claim that the RMV is issuing licenses to 1,900 deceased individuals who the RMV has verified are alive.
“This audit is outdated, as it was conducted before the implementation of an entirely new software system which has improved management and tracking capabilities,” Goddard added.