What happened to examining senior driving rules?
Regarding the recent letters to the editor, “Online for seniors, please” (Aug. 30) and “Online for seniors, endorsed” (Sept. 2), permit me to offer context to the shortsighted regulation regarding yearly driver’s licensing of New Mexico seniors.
Since April 2019, I had been back and forth by email on this matter with Alicia Ortiz, director of the Motor Vehicle Division, her associate Tomas Glover and House Speaker Brian Egolf. Here are the unfortunate facts surrounding it.
On April 9, 2019, I wrote to Ortiz regarding New Mexico’s yearly, driver’s license renewal procedure for seniors: “For all our neighboring states there are five-year renewal periods for seniors (CO, AZ, UT) and six years through age 84 in TX. In all respects, such as health status, demographics, education and health, our seniors are quite comparable with these states. Yet, our MVD license renewal regulations are significantly more restrictive, time-consuming and inconvenient. Given that we baby boomers are the best educated, most healthy and socially conscious generation, I would like to know whether you have any definite plans to bring this age requirement regulation more in line with our four neighboring states and, if not, why not?”
Ortiz replied, on April 16, 2019: “During the legislative session that just ended, House Memorial 67 was passed and requires the Motor Vehicle Division to research emerging trends in order to inform whether or not additional changes to our statutes are called for and if they are, what they should be.”
Her reply was most reassuring. In follow up, I sent an inquiry email to Egolf, who replied on May 20, 2019: “I would expect that the report from HM 67 would be presented to either the interim Revenue Stabilization and Tax Policy Committee, or the Transportation Infrastructure Revenue Committee, depending on the agendas of those two committees … I am happy to send you any information my office receives regarding the HM 67 report.”
Further, on June 10, 2019, Ortiz wrote: “House Memorial 67 was passed during the 2019 legislature and requires MVD to research trends and best practices related to license issuance to older drivers. The results of that research will inform future policy decisions and may lead to additional changes to legislation. We will certainly weigh customer service and convenience along with driver and road safety.”
Unfortunately, here is where the trail went cold, without further information for many months, regarding whether any House committee or state agency had actually followed up on the requirements of House Memorial 67. That is, until Feb. 10, when I received the following email reply from Glover, driver services bureau chief at the MVD: “We have not been invited by any Legislative Committee to provide the [HM 67] working group’s recommendations. Given that we’re more than halfway through the session, I am expecting that we will not be called this session to provide those recommendations.”
Clearly this matter was buried under the weight of bureaucratic neglect. Do we healthy and responsible seniors not count as legitimate citizens of our state whose needs ought to be addressed? I must remind readers and state officials that seniors make up a significant voting bloc. We should be honored and respected rather than neglected in this matter. I urge the New Mexico MVD and House legislators to revisit the matter regarding modernizing senior driver’s licensing procedures and statutes, especially given the difficulties posed by annual relicensing in any year, but especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.