Brief Description: Addressing Washington state compliance with the federal REAL ID Act of 2005.

Sponsors: Senate Committee on Transportation (originally sponsored by Senators Haugen, Swecker and Murray).

Senate Committee on Transportation
House Committee on Transportation

Background: In 2004, Congress established a cooperative state-federal process to create federal standards for drivers' licenses. On May 11, 2005, President Bush signed into law the REAL ID Act of 2005 (REAL ID Act). The REAL ID Act repeals the negotiated rulemaking process and establishes standards intended to improve security for state-issued drivers' licenses and personal identification cards. The REAL ID Act requires that certain verified, uniform information be placed on every state driver's license in a standard, machine readable format. Beginning in May 2008, no federal agency may accept for any official purpose a driver's license or identification card that does not meet the requirements of the REAL ID Act.

The Department of Licensing estimates that total expenditures to implement the REAL ID Act in Washington would be $96.7 million in 2007-2009, and $93.4 million in 2009-2011. No federal funding has been provided for the implementation of the REAL ID Act.

Summary: The Director of the Office of Financial Management must ensure that state agencies and programs do not expend funds to implement the REAL ID Act in Washington unless: (1) all reasonable privacy and data security protections are included; (2) the implementation does not place unreasonable costs or recordkeeping burdens on driver's license or identicard applicants; and (3) sufficient federal funds are received by Washington to implement the REAL ID Act requirements.

Votes on Final Passage:

Senate      41   4
House      95   2

Effective:   July 22, 2007