Destination: Registration
State seeks new home for Registry, warns it could leave city if suitable site isn’t found
WOONSOCKET – Cory Lebeau and Chelsea Laferriere don’t register a car every day, but when they do, the Cumberland residents do it at the Registry of Motor Vehicles branch on Pond Street.
“It’s the only one we go to,” said Lebeau. “It’s convenient. We just came from the bank, then we came here.”
Greater Woonsocket residents have enjoyed the benefits of having a registry close to home for years – a perk of geography that may go on for a long, long time.
Or not.
How much longer could become clearer this morning, when the state Division of Motor Vehicles opens ups bids from property owners vying to become the registry’s new landlord.
This is the third time in roughly two years that the DMV has sought out new space for a satellite office exclusively in Woonsocket. And it will also be the last, according to DMV spokesman Paul Grimaldi.
If the DMV is unsuccessful in finding suitable quarters for a larger satellite office with more parking within the city, it will make plans to broaden the search to other communities in northern Rhode Island, perhaps Cumberland or Lincoln.
“We wouldn’t shut down the Woonsocket office immediately,” said Grimaldi. “It would remain open. Sometime later in 2016, the spring perhaps, the DMV would put out another request for proposals for anywhere in northern Rhode Island.”
But the DMV is hopeful that the third time will be the charm in its search for a new location in Woonsocket proper – its first choice for a new location. Grimaldi said the DMV has been working “very hard” with the office of Mayor Lisa Baldelli-Hunt to bring in suitable bids.
Baldelli-Hunt couldn’t be reached yesterday, but she has said previously
that she is pushing to move the registry to one of plazas on Diamond Hill Road.
Grimaldi said brisk customer demand is the top reason the DMV wants to keep a registry in the city. About 11 percent of all registry transactions statewide take place at the Pond Street location.
The main branch in Cranston accounts for most of the traffic, but the DMV also operates satellite offices in Providence, Warren and Middletown.
“Woonsocket is the second-busiest satellite outside the main branch,” said Grimaldi.
The DMV is seeking new quarters with at least 5,000 square feet of office space – substantially more than the existing location – and plenty of parking. The DMV would hire more help, increase the number of service windows, install a new queuing system to direct traffic, and create a position for an “information officer” – a sort of gatekeeper who pre-screens incoming traffic to make sure customers are prepared with the proper documents before they reach a service window.
Despite two prior rounds of public solicitations for bids, the DMV has so far been unsuccessful in fielding offers that meet the minimum specifications, according to Grimaldi.
The notion of losing a local registry, meanwhile, went over like overripe tomatoes with customers filtering in and out of the location yesterday.
“A lot of people would be mad,’ said Leo Giguere, a lifelong Woonsocket resident. “It wouldn’t just be me.” Diane Sartini agrees. “It’s a lot more convenient for them to be right here in the city,” says Sartini, who also lives here.
The most common complaint about the registry, regardless of the location, is that the wait-times are too long. But none of the customers interviewed yesterday thought so. On the contrary, Sartini said it took just a few minutes to get a state ID card.
The DMV has maintained a registry in the city for more than three decades. But few state offices have been more mobile. The current location is one of at least four that have served as a satellite DMV since the early 1980s.
The DMV used to have an office in the basement of the now-defunct Seventh Division of the District Court in the early 1980s. Sometime prior to the conversion of that building to private apartments, the registry relocated to an office building on Main Street, not far from Chan’s. Then it moved to the ground floor of the Hospital Trust building, opposite City Hall.
The current office, located at 217 Pond St., shares space with the state Department of Labor and Training.
Bids for yet a new location will be opened at 10 a.m. today at the DMV’s offices in Providence.