States to DHS: Either fund the Real ID Act, or drop it

DHS secretary Michael Chertoff called on state legislators to embrace new federal driver’s license requirements to strengthen security. State lawmakers, however, later demanded that Congress either fund the program or drop it.

In a speech at the annual meeting of the National Conference of State Legislatures, Chertoff sought to assuage privacy concerns about the federal Real ID Act, saying there were no plans to create a federal database of drivers’ personal information. The Real ID Act requires states to offer their residents driver’s licenses which include biometric information and RFID technology. States which do not provide such licenses by May 2008, the law’s deadline, will see their residents unable to enter federal buildings, open bank accounts, or purchase an airline ticket.

The goal of the Real ID Act is to unify the patchwork of state licensing rules and make it harder to obtain a card fraudulently. Chertoff, however, did not address one of the biggest concerns raised in state legislatures about the Real ID requirements — the cost. One estimate predicted that the program would cost the state of Pennsylvania alone up to $85 million.

NCSL members later voted to approve a resolution to demand Congress either find a way to pay for the Real ID Act, or to repeal it by the end of 2007.

“Basically we need to put our foot down and tell Congress that they need to fully fund it before they force the states to comply with the Real ID act,” Georgia state senator Mitch Seabaugh, a Republican who introduced the resolution, said earlier this week. “If they can’t do it, they need to repeal the law.”

-read more in this AP report