Featured California’s $100 registration surcharge

As in the case of much legislation, it can change yearly. Some may add, some may take away. Odds are more states, in a never-ending search for more revenue will be adding.
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Apparently some people think that would be "unconstitutional". Seems to be more of a political fight just because the other party thought of it first.

 

I'm against the GPS tracking suggestions a few states are trying. It adds overhead, and the test programs mean a private company siphoning some off the proceeds. Keep it simple.

And if a state isn't doing regular safety inspections with odometer readings, why the hell not? These are heavy objects rolling around at a high rate of speed. They do kill people.

 

NJ checks for emissions, so no state inspection on EVs.

 

They no longer do the brake and light test? I knew they moved from yearly.

Registrations require declaring miles on the car. Can lie, but eventually, someone will get an official reading on most cars.

 

True.

In Colorado, outside of the big cities, there are zero inspections. Colorado is also a California compliant state. It makes obeying the law kind of optionally hard. On the one hand I know a lot of people with catalytic converter deletes. But if I want to fix the bad catalytic converter on my Prius I can't buy a used or non-OEM cat without driving out of state, which would technically be breaking the law if I did.

 

Unfortunately Virginia is doing BOTH although they say GS is not always involved. They charge for all miles anyway, including out of state travel. You are charged monthly by this company & then sent an odometer screenshot once a year to "true up". Although both the Highway Use Fee & the required vehicle inspection are both under the same department, They apparently do not / cannot communicate with each other.

 

Do they record the odometer readings during emissions checks? If not it should be reasonably trivial to add that to the requirement.

 

That's to allow the grafting. Can't give a GPS tracking company a nice contract if the law just used odometer data the government already had.

 

The last time I went to inspection was in 2018 and I don't remember them doing much of anything except plugging it in for emissions. I believe they now leave it up to the cops for everything else, broken glass, lights, etc. and I see every day how that's working out.

 

They CLAIM they offer a service without the GPS. Not sure I trust that though...

 

It's probably also just thrown into a general fund like fuel taxes are. So it probably just helps a little of everything, including in a small part of road care.

 

How many of your states have a safety inspection? My county is exempt from emissions inspections so they could get mileage from our safety inspections which get reported to the state before they will issue you a license plate sticker signifying paid taxes and registration.

Does it include a check for an altered exhaust or muffler system?

My neighborhood is bedeviled by young men in loud trucks, some with obviously altered muffler systems who delight in reving to change the sound at all hours of the day or night. When approached, they just laugh. Until we got the sheriff involved and a specific truck got pulled over and received several court appearance level tickets.

There he goes now. But with a muted muffler system. Bet it cost him a bundle between court and retrofitting.