Procedure On The Review Process For Personalized License Plates
Revised December 2002
PURPOSE: To establish a policy and set of
procedures for the Division of Motor
Vehicles to use in the
administration of the review, approval, rejection and
recall of personalized license
plates in order to provide consistency and
uniformity within the personalized
license plate program.
I.
AUTHORITY:
Section 320.0805, Florida Statutes
II.
DEFINITIONS:
A.
Personalized License Plate means a license plate manufactured with a
specific combination of numbers
and/or letters chosen by a motor vehicle
owner to be printed on their motor vehicle license plate for an additional fee.
B.
Recall means to require a personalized license plate to be returned for
cancellation after the license plate has been issued and determined to be
obscene or objectionable.
C.
Obscene means a combination of letters and/or numbers found to be offensive to
morality or decency, indecent, lewd, abominable, disgusting,
a slur, profanity or description of body parts.
D.
Objectionable means a combination of letters and/or numbers that provide
a feeling or expression of disapproval, dislike, hatred, violence, method of violence or threat toward a person or group.
E.
Otherwise Objectionable means a personalized license plate, which has
already been issued or assigned for issuance as a regular, personalized,
special or specialty license plate or the combination of characters is not
allowed by law.
F.
Review Board means a group of employees of the Department of Highway
approval or rejection of characters
submitted as choices for a personalized
license plate prior to issuance or
the recall of a previously issued personalized license plate, when determined
to be obscene or objectionable. The
members of the Review Board must make every effort
to be fair, consistent,
open-minded, reasonable and non-prejudiced regarding all racial, religious and
national groups. When a decision has
(2)
been made to deny the rejection or recall of a personalized license plate and additional information or proof of extenuating circumstances is provided, the Review Board will reconsider the plate based on such information.
G.
Review Authority means the Director or Assistant Director of the Division of Motor
Vehicles, who has final authority for the rejection or recall of a personalized
license plate.
III.
POLICY:
It is the policy of Division of Motor Vehicles to
administer the personalized license plate program in a fair, consistent and
unbiased manner. The division will make
every effort to avoid issuing a personalized license plate that is obscene or
objectionable. However, if such a plate
is issued erroneously, the division will take appropriate action when a
legitimate complaint is received.
IV.
GENERAL RESPONSIBILITIES:
A.
Tax Collector’s Staff Members have the responsibility to receive and process
initial applications for personalized license plates in the county
for personalized license plates
to ensure the combinations of characters are not obscene or objectionable and
enter them on the FRVIS 2000 System to determine if the choices are available
for issuance. If approved and available,
the plates are reserved in the FRVIS 2000 System.
B.
Inventory Section Employees are responsible for screening personalized
license plate orders generated on the FRVIS 2000 System to determine whether the reserved license plate choices are approved or rejected.
C.
Review Board is responsible for review of personalized license plates referred to
them. They are responsible for
requesting further research as deemed necessary to enable them to make a
recommendation to reject or recall such plate.
D. Review Authority has the ultimate responsibility for making the final decision on personalized license plates referred to him or her to determine if such plates should be recalled.
E. Correspondence Section in the Bureau of Titles and Registrations has the responsibility for research, acknowledging complaints in writing and preparing the appropriate letters for rejection or recall of a personalized license plate.
(3)
V. PROCEDURES:
The following information provides the written procedures and refers to the applicable exhibits for rejection or recall of personalized license plates.
A.
Rejection Of An Request For Personalized License Plates:
1.
Daily the Inventory Section Employee screens the personalized license
plate order on the FRVIS Computer System to determine if such plates should be
approved or rejected.
Sources used to determine if a license plate should
be approved or rejected are as follows:
a.
An unabridged dictionary.
b.
Slang dictionary.
c.
Medical dictionary.
d.
The foreign language department at a state university.
2.
If a license plate configuration is identified as one that could be
defined as obscene or objectionable, the license plate is referred to the
Personalized License Plate Review Board on Exhibit A.
B.
Recall Of An Issued Personalized License Plate
Personalized license plates are only recalled when
the Personalized License Plate Review Board and Review Authority have
determined that such plate should be recalled.
1.
A complaint on a personalized license plate may be submitted in
one of the following formats:
a.
Written correspondence by mail or fax
b.
Computer e-mail
If a verbal complaint is received, the complainant
must submit their complaint in writing.
Regardless of the format in which the complaint is received, the
Personalized License Plate Action Form must be completed to go before the Personalized
License Plate Review Board.
(4)
2.
The complaint is referred to the Correspondence Section to research the
database files to determine if the complaint is an actual personalized license
plate configuration issued by this state and ensure that the complaint
documents are in order.
3.
When the complaint file is completed, it is submitted to the Review
Board for action. The chairperson of the
Review Board will schedule a meeting of the members of the Review Board to
determine whether the personalized license plate configuration is indeed
considered obscene or objectionable. The
board must take into consideration the definitions of obscene and objectionable
as defined in this procedure.
Additionally, the members of the Review Board must make every effort to
be fair, consistent, open-minded, reasonable and unbiased regarding all racial,
religious and national groups. When the
review is completed and a decision made, the Review Board must complete the
Personalized License Plate Action Form (Exhibit A) and forward the form and
backup documents to the Review Authority for final approval.
4.
When the Personalized License Plate Action Form (Exhibit A) is received
by the Review Authority, the Director, Assistant Director or their
representative will make a final decision concerning the rejection or recall of
the license plate. The decision will be
indicated on the form and forwarded to the Inventory Control or Correspondence
Section for the appropriate action.
5.
When the Personalized License Plate Action Form (Exhibit A) is
completed for the configuration for personalized license plate to be rejected,
the Correspondence Section will prepare a letter (Exhibit B) to go to the
county. If Exhibit A has been completed
with a decision indicated to recall the personalized license plate, the
Correspondence Section will prepare the Exhibit C letter to recall the
personalized license plate.
6.
The Correspondence Section must add the rejected or recalled license
plate configuration to the FRVIS 2000 System Exclusion File to keep the license
plate from ever being issued again.
7.
If the license plate configuration has been rejected, the Inventory
Control Section must cancel the plate from the order.
(5)
8.
If the license plate configuration has been recalled, the Correspondence
Section must change the license plate status to “Cancelled” in the FRVIS 2000
System and place an administrative stop on the system.