Should we demand end to long DMV waits or is that just “the future that awaits us?”

We don’t usually respond to The Wichita Eagle’s “Letters to the editor,” but Chuck Jones is probably typical of the people who wonder how we ended up with such long lines at the Division of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Jones wrote;

“Every once in a while The Eagle publishes another story about some poor taxpayer who spent six hours or more renewing his driver’s license. What is mind-boggling to me is that the citizens of Kansas are putting up with this absurdity.”

Well Mr. Jones, the people of Kansas not only tolerate this abuse, they VOTED FOR IT. Governor Sam Brownback and his recently elected allies promised to make major cuts to the government budget and to provide this state with a SMALLER GOVERNMENT. They openly fired thousands of public employees and promised us we would never really miss them.

“The governor should call in those in charge of this mess and tell them they have three months to reduce the wait time to 30 minutes or less and that if they can’t do it, they will be replaced. Repeat as necessary until the problem is fixed.”

The problem here is that the governor IS responsible for this mess. Brownback created it with the help of his Tea Party Republican allies, who just got elected about a year ago. The drivers license bureau is not the only government entity that is being affected by all of this “SMALLER GOVERNMENT” we were promised. Anyone who needs to call and talk to a person about any government service will find long waits and anything that is sent to them, will take three times longer to get. For example, it now takes me six to eight weeks to receive my new teaching license, rather than the one to two weeks it took before Brownback. This is what happens when employees are just let go and no plan is in place to deal with the overload of customers. This is not California. This is Kansas and it is being promoted as the state of the future. This is the Tea Party utopia they want to promote in every state of the union, including California.

So Mr. Jones, warn your California friends that following the lead of Kansas will lead to this and other forms of frustration to anyone who needs to use government services. The only way to fix this is to GET RID of our governor and all his Tea Party friends. THEY CREATED THIS MESS. They lied and said those workers were not really needed and we would never notice them being fired.

If you have had to visit the DMV, just learn to get used to it, because this is the state of the future and this is just part of that future. Either vote the bums out or just get used to this. It will only get worse as this “cut to the core” philosophy continues. 

So remember Kansas—you voted for this! What did you think was going to happen?

Pix by http://www.clarisconsulting.net/blog/dont-wait/.