TAYLORSVILLE, Utah — While announcing GRIT, his new DOGE-like initiative, Governor Spencer Cox pointed out how the DMV is a good example of how efficient a government agency can be.
Of course, when FOX 13 News talked to the public at the DMV office in Taylorsville on Friday, Cox's observation was a matter of opinion.
"My daughter actually went to the DMV and she was out in less than 5 minutes," said new Utah resident Antionio Star, "and I went to the driver's license division and it took me a little longer!"
That’s the kind of comment Utah State Tax Commission Chair John Valentine likes to hear, as his group is in charge of operations at DMV offices.
"The DMV has been amazing," he claimed. "For the last 11 years I’ve been at the commission, we’ve gone from being the funny thing about how long it takes to wait — take a number, wait in the chair for 35 minutes, and then you get your service — today we don’t have that."
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Unfortunately for Valentine, not all DMV customers we talked with felt the same way, as they would have welcomed a 35-minute wait.
"The worst part is waiting in line for 2 hours," said DMV visitor Tracy Thacker. "I had to sit and wait for two hours because I didn’t have an appointment, and on the website to get an appointment, they didn’t have a tab for what I was looking for. So I couldn’t get an appointment and I had to wait."
Thacker, a West Valley City resident, needed a new title for an old vehicle. Another customer looking to complete a title transfer walked out when she saw the wait time was an hour and 15 minutes.
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"If they think that they’ve improved the efficiency, I’d hate to think what it was before it was improved," said Terry Peterson.
The State Tax Commission admits it can get better at serving the public, and that the launch of the GRIT initiative will only help reach that goal.
"DMV is working really well, but we have a couple things we’re gonna work on as part of this initiative," Valentine admitted. "One of which is e-titling. We’re gonna be working and involve customers with being able to transfer titles electronically."
If Valentine's vision came true, there would be no reason to to pay the DMV a visit.
