NEW
YORK CITY (By Nina Berstein,
NYTimes) September 22, 2007 — New
York State, home to more than
500,000 illegal immigrants, will
issue driver’s licenses without
regard to immigration status under a
policy change announced yesterday by
Gov. Eliot Spitzer.
The
change rolls back rules adopted four
years ago under the Pataki
administration that made it
difficult, if not impossible, for
tens of thousands of immigrants to
obtain driver’s licenses because
they could not prove legal status.
Under the new rules, the Department
of Motor Vehicles will accept a
current foreign passport as proof of
identity without also requiring a
valid yearlong visa or other
evidence of legal immigration.
The
policy, which does not require
legislative approval, will be phased
in starting in December and will be
tied to new antifraud measures, the
governor said. Those measures will
include the authentication of
foreign passports and the use of
photo comparison technology to
ensure that no driver has more than
one license.
The
governor called it a “common sense
change” that will improve traffic
safety and lower insurance costs for
all New Yorkers by ensuring that
more immigrants have valid licenses
and auto insurance. Giving more
immigrants verifiable identification
will also enhance law enforcement by
bringing people out of the shadows,
he asserted.
“The D.M.V. is not the I.N.S.,” Mr.
Spitzer said, referring to the
federal Immigration and Customs
Enforcement agency, now part of
Homeland Security, by its old
initials of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service.
The
move goes against the national
trend. Many states, prodded by
demands to crack down on identity
fraud, have added requirements that
effectively prevent illegal
immigrants from obtaining driver’s
licenses.
All
but eight states now require drivers
to prove legal status to obtain
driver’s licenses, and those eight —
Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan,
New Mexico, Oregon, Utah and
Washington — have come under
pressure to add such a requirement.
To
keep New York from becoming a magnet
for people unable to obtain driver’s
licenses elsewhere, the Spitzer
administration will propose
legislation to add a residency
requirement similar to one already
in effect in 27 states, David J.
Swarts, the motor vehicles
commissioner, said.
Mr.
Swarts and other officials pointed
to a study showing that unlicensed
drivers were almost five times more
likely to be in fatal crashes than
people with valid driver’s licenses.
The State Department of Insurance
estimates that the new rules will
save New York drivers $120 million
each year by reducing premium costs
associated with uninsured motorists
by 34 percent.
The
change fulfilled a promise Mr.
Spitzer made repeatedly last year in
his campaign, and it was hailed by
immigrant organizations and labor
unions that had pushed hard for it.
Those groups said that the
regulations imposed by the Pataki
administration had hurt about
250,000 immigrants who needed
licenses to drive to work, to
hospitals or to schools.
“Immigrant communities throughout
the nation can take heart that
today’s victory may begin to turn
the tide toward sensible and humane
reforms at the federal level,” said
Chung-Wha Hong, executive director
of the New York Immigration
Coalition, an umbrella group for
more than 150 immigrant self-help
and advocacy organizations.
But
the new policy drew immediate fire
from groups that had welcomed the
Pataki administration rules as a
needed crackdown on license fraud
and as the kind of national security
measure demanded by the Sept. 11
attacks.
Peter Gadiel, the president of 9/11
Families for a Secure America, whose
son died in the World Trade Center,
released a scathing statement even
before the official announcement
yesterday.
“Governor Spitzer will demonstrate
abject stupidity and breathtaking
disregard for the victims of 9/11 if
he hands these powerful ID’s to
people who sneak across our
borders,” he wrote. “Terrorists here
illegally used licenses to kill my
son and thousands of others in the
World Trade Center; if they do it
again using New York licenses issued
by this governor, the blood of the
victims will be on Mr. Spitzer’s
hands.”
When that statement was read aloud
by a reporter to Mr. Spitzer, he
seemed taken aback, then called the
words inflammatory and “way beyond”
the bounds of appropriate discourse.
He added that people who ignore the
reality of illegal immigrants only
encourage the use of false Social
Security numbers and driver’s
licenses.
Michael A. L. Balboni, Mr. Spitzer’s
deputy secretary for public safety,
said the New York driver’s license
was one of the most secure documents
in the nation and that the new
licensing regime would make it even
better.
Social Security cards and birth
certificates, which include no
photos or other biometric data, have
also been prone to fraud, he said.
New
York will join 18 other states in
trying technology that will check a
driver’s photo overnight against all
other photos in the state’s driver
database, to prevent people from
holding multiple licenses, officials
said. The technology will be tested
in a pilot project upstate.
The
new policy will start with about
152,000 New Yorkers who have, or
once had, licenses but were unable
to renew them under the Pataki
rules, Mr. Swarts said. This group
will be notified by letter next week
about how to begin a relicensing
process. It will start at the end of
the year, and for some will involve
a new road test.
A
second phase, to begin in April,
will open the application process to
all, with as many as 500,000 people
newly eligible for licenses. This
will involve a more rigorous
screening, Mr. Swarts said,
including a four- to six-week
process of authenticating foreign
passports and other foreign identity
documents.
Across the street from the Midtown
office building where Mr. Spitzer
delivered the news, a throng of
jubilant immigrants from community
organizations waved signs and
shouted their approval.
One
member of the group, who would
identify himself only as Cesar, an
immigrant from Peru, said he had
been afraid of driving without
authorization and had had to depend
on friends to drive him to work.
“Now, thank God, I won’t have this
difficulty in my life,” he said.