Knapp survives the DMV!

I'M SCRAWLING THESE WORDS ONTO A YELLOW LEGAL PAD while standing in a very long line at the Henderson office of the DMV. Hey, wait a minute, you're thinking to yourself. Knappster doesn't live in Henderson. What gives?

The fact is, I got a hot tip about the Henderson DMV from a guy I met while in waiting in line at the East Sahara DMV office. Put it this way, the line at East Sahara could kick the crap out of the line in Henderson and make it squeal like a little girl. The guy I met told me that the lines at the Henderson DMV weren't nearly as long as the Disney-esque queues at most of the Las Vegas offices, and he was right. Long, but not that long.

You're probably asking yourself why I would take the word of a perfect stranger on a matter of such importance, and just why didn't the stranger take his own advice? First, the man in line had no choice but to visit East Sahara's DMV because it's the only office that could handle the transaction he needed. Second, the guy was no stranger.

Oh, I admit, we didn't know each other at all when fate threw us together at the end of that line, a line so long that its end point appeared to rise above and then dip below the curvature of the planet. But by the time the two of us parted, many years after that first meeting at the back of the line, we were no longer strangers. We were friends. After all, I was there with him when he got a cell phone call about the birth of his daughter, just as I was there in line when that same daughter graduated from high school. He and I made it through a few of life's sadder moments, such as when his wife had him declared legally dead because he never returned from the DMV. I've since learned that by the time this poor guy finally reached the front of the line, he was so old that he could no longer pass the vision test.

Long lines could be a blessing, I suppose. Since DMV offices are public buildings, smoking is not allowed. I'd think this would be a perfect opportunity for smokers to kick the habit because after they enter the building, it will be a long time before they fire up a smoke.

By no means am I taking any potshots at the folks who work at DMV. If anything, they deserve Medals of Honor and maybe a few extra weeks of vacation for putting up with the impossible on a daily basis. Folks like you and me enter the DMV quagmire only once or twice a year, if at all. They're in the middle of it every single day. Long lines are only part of the problem they face. People get pretty testy standing around in line for a long time and tend to take it out on DMV employees every chance they get, venting their spleens and spewing invective. Toss into the mix the fact that a large percentage of those who show up at DMV understand little, if any English but still they expect to be given licenses to navigate our streets, whether they can comprehend road signs or not.

Oh, that wonderful growth. Ain't it grand? We've all heard the news that after 19 straight years of balls-to-the-wall growth in Southern Nevada, things are finally slowing down a bit here. Heck, Nevada is no longer No. 1 in the nation in growth. (We lost out to Arizona by one one-hundredth of a percentage point. Darn.) I'm sure this news will come as a big surprise to the hardy survivors at DMV, meaning the brave souls who challenge those long lines and the braver souls who work there every day. DMV is on the front lines of the growth issue. Literally and figuratively. If there's been a growth slowdown, it hasn't sunk in with the Motor Vehicles folks.

The fact that the department manages to somehow keep up with the demand for service is simply amazing. They've made it possible to do a lot of stuff online. They've installed kiosks. The system they've worked out for moving the long lines and processing motorists is a model of efficiency. But as good as it is, it is a daily struggle for DMV staffers to keep their heads above the relentless waves of humanity that wash up at DMV's door every day.

How often have we heard that old chestnut about growth paying for itself? Oh really? So growth has paid for the $3.8 billion shortfall in spending for roads and highways?

I wonder if growth pays for the tens of thousands of uninsured families who now rely on UMC, the public hospital, for most of their medical care. Is it possible that some of that $34 million in hospital debt might be related to the ongoing influx of poor families into our community? And yes, DMV assesses fees to those who apply for licenses and registration, but does anyone every calculate the true cost of those long lines?

If you have to spend a couple of hours in line every time you have business with DMV, or if your family has to wait for six or more hours in the emergency room at UMC before you see a doctor, do you find yourself in agreement with those who think growth pays for itself? As you sit in the parking lot that once was U.S. 95, are you likely to beat the drum for more growth, more land sales, more housing developments, more condo towers, more casinos?

It's amazing to me that there haven't been a lot of gun battles or mass murders at DMV offices. The department does an admirable job of trying to keep up, but the real reason the lines are so long ... and the traffic is so bad ... and the ER at UMC is so crowded ... and the schools are lagging behind ... is because we continue to grow like a bat out of hell.

By all means, let's have more of it.

Other stuff

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