Monday, June 15, 2009

BRISTOLTODAY.COM: Kicking out the press


BRISTOLTODAY.COM: Kicking out the press

By: Steve Collins
Posted by Frank Smith at 15.6.09

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Stamford DMV, set to close, busier than others set to stay openBy Martin B. Cassidy
Staff Writer
Posted: 06/14/2009 10:48:45 PM EDT
Updated: 06/15/2009 07:44:26 AM EDT

STAMFORD -- The Department of Motor Vehicles' part-time satellite office at City Hall, which the state wants to close to save money, handled more transactions than two others the state plans to keep open.

The number of transactions at the Stamford office grew 55 percent -- from 31,825 to 49,388 -- since 2005, DMV statistics show.

Last year, the Willimantic full-service office had 48,552 transactions, and the Putnam part-time office had 23,397, the statistics show.

Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell has said her office will decide whether to close the Stamford office at the end of June. Benjamin Barnes, who heads the Stamford Office of Operations, said he hopes to find a way to allow the office to stay.

The state announced the closure in February to help fill a budget deficit of $8.7 billion over the next two years.

The cost of running the Stamford office last year, aside from labor, was about $35,000, DMV spokesman William Seymour said. That amount pays for running databases and computer equipment, Seymour said.

He declined to elaborate on the factors the state weighed in choosing to close Stamford over other offices.

After an outcry from lawmakers and residents, Rell put off closing the Stamford office from April 3 to June 30. But the DMV cut the hours in half; the office now is open only Wednesdays and Fridays.

If the Stamford office is closed, seven DMV workers would be transferred to the Norwalk DMV office, which is understaffed, the state has said.

Stamford allows the DMV to use the fifth-floor office rent-free, and that would continue if it is kept open, Barnes said. The city hoped to collect rent from the DMV beginning this year but abandoned the idea, he said.

"Right now, it's more important to preserve the service of the DMV to the citizens of Stamford and the area than recovering costs," Barnes said.

Even if the office remains rent-free, the DMV needs workers for Stamford and Norwalk, Seymour said.

"We still don't have enough workers to keep both facilities running," he said.

State Sen. Andrew McDonald, D-Stamford, said perhaps lawmakers will restore the money because the state spends only $35,000 a year to keep the office open.

McDonald said the state can justify keeping the office open because Stamford is a business center in a densely populated area. With Greenwich, the population is nearly 180,000, McDonald said.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau Web site, Stamford's population of 119,300 is the fourth-highest in the state, slightly behind New Haven, with 124,000 residents, and Hartford, with 124,500. Bridgeport is the largest city, with 137,900 residents. It has a full-service DMV office.

McDonald said the closing would inconvenience Stamford and Greenwich residents without any indication that a consolidated Norwalk office will save money or improve operations.

"If the exercise is to conduct a cost-benefit analysis, keeping the Stamford office open in a rent-free space to serve that high volume of customers is a no-brainer," McDonald said. "Putting 50,000 people on the road to the Norwalk DMV to save $30,000 doesn't seem like a high-yield budget proposal."

Last month, Rell proposed more DMV cutbacks, including closing all branches one day a week to save $2.4 million, and closing the full-service New Britain branch to save about $1 million.

"We are looking at and evaluating all our operations now," Seymour said.

Staff Writer Martin B. Cassidy can be reached at martin.cassidy@scni.com or (203) 964-2264.

June 15, 2009 at 12:40 PM
The Thorn said...

"He said that he was sorry, but that the Department of Motor Vehicles doesn't allow reporters inside their buildings to wander around talking to people."
...............................

I sincerely hope this reporter does a follow-up story. I am quite interested on how the state is able to have a rule barring reporters from a public area of a public building. I have been to this office many times, and I am not aware of any specific conditions that need to be met to be in the "public area" of this office, especially since he was not in any way interfering with operation of this office.

I hope he is able to get a comment from Governor Rell for the justification of such a policy.

June 15, 2009 at 4:12 PM

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