Surcharge Amnesty

[helosailor]

Wharz Beefalohaltom?!

Start the New Year off Right! Is your driver license currently suspended because you still owe surcharges and haven’t been able to make payments? Make your New Year’s resolution to pay them off!

The Texas Department of Public Safety will provide an Amnesty period to offer lower payments for individuals whose driving privileges have been suspended and are in default on their surcharges. The goal of the Amnesty period is to bring drivers into compliance with the surcharge law, and allow them to become licensed and insured drivers.
Surcharges are in addition to all other reinstatement fees required for other administrative actions and do not replace any administrative suspension, revocation, disqualification or cancellation action that results from these same convictions. The amnesty reduction does not apply to any other fees that you may owe the Department of Public Safety.

https://www.txsurchargeonline.com/AmnestyMain.aspx

[jdgregory84]

The goal is to get whatever money they can before the surcharges are deemed unconstitutional.

[bcoop]

The goal is to get whatever money they can before the surcharges are deemed unconstitutional.

Exactly. There is a class action lawsuit forming against the State, from what I've heard/read. This very well could end up costing them far more than it ever earned them.

[Baba Ganoush]

The goal is to get whatever money they can before the surcharges are deemed unconstitutional.

How long til that happens? Greedy fucks.

[Broncojohnny]

Exactly. There is a class action lawsuit forming against the State, from what I've heard/read. This very well could end up costing them far more than it ever earned them.

I hope someone rapes them in the mouth for it, fucking crooked bastards.

[jdgregory84]

How long til that happens? Greedy fucks.

I don't know. I just wonder if the people that have paid surcharges already will ever get anything back?

[Ratt]

They owe me $100.

[bcoop]

I don't know. I just wonder if the people that have paid surcharges already will ever get anything back?

I'm actually looking in to this, I'll post up when I get an answer.

[mystic96]

So all the people that got stuck with paying them are just kinda SOL because they had bad timing on when they decided to F-up?

I know i'd like to get some of that back

[TexasDevilDog]

Surprise, people driving around with suspended DL!

[idrivea4banger]

I'm actually looking in to this, I'll post up when I get an answer.

Yeah id like to know also. Id like to get my $1k back.

[Hmbre97]

I wouldn't mind getting my $300 back.

[Raskal]

3000 something here.. I just finished paying mine off when it was first posted that the state was doing away with the program.

[motoman]

I'd love my $1300 back.

[jdgregory84]

There's nothing official yet, but hopefully soon. Cliff notes, a DWI lawyer from Dallas is sueing the state of Texas in federal court for violation of the 5th amendment which states, no more than one punishment can be given for a violation of the law. The surcharge is essentially double jeopardy. Even if she's not taken seriously, there are members in the Texas legislature that agree, even the guy who wrote the initial bill says that it was a mistake. Even MADD is ok with it as long as their funding isn't affected. (which shows you what MADD is really about)

By John Henry

jfhenry@star-telegram.com

Mimi Coffey wants to scrap Texas' Driver Responsibility Program.

If she doesn't accomplish the task first, the Texas Legislature appears poised to do so.

The Fort Worth defense attorney has filed a federal lawsuit asserting that the surcharges assessed through the program are unconstitutional under the Fifth Amendment.

The act, established in 2003, violates the double-jeopardy clause in the U.S. Constitution that prohibits the government from imposing more than one punishment for a single offense, Coffey said.

The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.

The charges are levied in addition to the punitive measures of a court of law and collected through the Department of Public Safety.

"The surcharges are outrageous," Coffey said. "You can't get blood out of a turnip; people just can't pay them."

Under the law, people convicted of drunken driving are required to pay surcharges of $1,000 to $2,000 a year for three years on a first conviction. A second conviction carries a surcharge of at least $2,000 for three years. Driving without insurance could result in a surcharge of up to $250 for three years.

The law has generated increasingly negative attention during the economic downturn. Critics of the law say it is illogical, causing a grim cycle of financial hardship for people who are struggling to get back on their feet after an already very costly conviction. A first conviction carries up to two years in jail and a fine up to $2,000, plus court costs and lawyers' fees.

"You can't deprive property without due process," Coffey said. "I think it's time somebody do something about this."

An inability or unwillingness to pay the surcharges results in a driver's license suspension.

Coffey said the program is also causing a logjam in the court system. Many defendants would rather take their chances at trial than accept plea agreements because of the high fees. Neither prosecutors nor judges have the authority to waive the surcharges.

An amnesty program starting in January will give indigent people an opportunity to pay 10 percent of what they owe up to $250. But even that announcement was a lightning rod for detractors, who said the charges would then be meted out unequally.

Repealing the law appears to have significant political support. Even the bill's author, former state Rep. Mike Krusee, R-Round Rock, has said that the legislation was a "mistake."

State Rep. Leo Berman, R-Tyler, has filed a bill to repeal, but he said he will refile to exclude charges assessed to drunken drivers. Berman said he is specifically targeting more minor violations, such as expired inspection stickers or insurance.

"I do feel it's double, triple and even quadruple jeopardy," Berman said. "The state should not be doing this, when people can't even save enough money to renew their liability insurance because they have to continue paying fines to the state for years."

That he won't address the same charges for drunken drivers, Coffey said: "It's like saying you are against racial discrimination, and you support laws that restrict discrimination against Hispanics and Asians, but the bill will not address blacks." Coffey said she is convinced that the Texas Senate will move for complete repeal.

Mothers Against Drunk Driving said it would support eliminating the program if the state replaces funding to trauma centers, which receive about half of the collected surcharges.

"We have seen nothing that shows the program helps deter drunken driving," said Bill Lewis, a MADD public policy liaison, who testified before the Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee in October. He thinks this is so because the public seems to be unaware of it.

"The time is right politically," Coffey said. "This is not an issue of where you stand on drunk driving. This is about civil rights."



Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/12/05/2681442/drunken-driving-surcharges-faces.html#ixzz1CDiDBzv9"