A kinder, gentler DMV

Martin Kuz

Sunday, Dec. 5, 1999 | 9:33 a.m.

Enduring long lines at the state Department of Motor Vehicles and Public Safety in recent weeks has been bad enough. Now Nevada residents can look forward to DMV workers going postal.

No, not in the common sense of the phrase -- that is, unhinged postal workers gunning down co-workers. Instead, state DMV officials want to "go postal" in mimicking the successful efforts of the U.S. Postal Service in recent years to provide better customer service.

Acting DMV Director John Drew said the public relations fallout since the September launch of Genesis, the agency's troubled new statewide computer system, underscores that DMV employees need help with more than high-tech skills.

"My personal opinion is that this department, on the motor-vehicle side, has not been very customer-service-oriented. Customer service and people skills should be higher priorities than they have been in the past," Drew said.

"If you can teach something like that to post office workers, why can't the DMV do the same thing? I think we can."

Such jaw-dropping candor from a government official is rare in itself. But more to the point, Drew's comments amount to what DMV critics view as a long overdue admission that, beyond exterminating bugs in the Genesis system, the agency's user-unfriendly reputation has got to go.

Drew's acknowledgement of the need for a kinder, gentler DMV comes as the furor -- and seemingly endless lines -- created by Genesis finally begin to subside. The $33.5 million glitch-plagued computer program, designed to up the agency's efficiency in processing driver licensing and vehicle registration, did just the opposite for weeks after the system debuted Sept. 7.

A maddening combination of computer snafus and a lack of employee training on the new system resulted in huge delays at DMV branch offices across the state. Customers were forced to wait six to eight hours for something as simple as a driver's license renewal. Their frustration led to verbal run-ins with overwhelmed DMV clerks who on occasion reacted by offering service with a sneer.

Persistent customer complaints about the attitude of DMV employees convinced Drew that the agency has to find ways to repair its dented image. He thinks the DMV could bolster its customer relations by adopting methods used by the postal service and large retailers, including monitoring of phone calls for "quality assurance" and posting supervisors on the floor to assist workers.

The agency also should give greater weight to people skills when screening potential employees, and provide rigorous, hands-on, customer-service training to new hires, Drew added.

"We teach them the mechanics of how to do a motor-vehicle transaction, but we don't necessarily teach them how to interact with a customer. We need to do that if we're going to improve," he said.

A little late

The ideas may seem obvious -- and late in coming. But state lawmakers critical of the DMV will take late over never.

State Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas, sits on the legislative subcommittee charged with reviewing the progress of Genesis. He said DMV administrators sometimes bristle at the scrutiny, and that their contentious disposition can quickly trickle down to employees who deal with the public.

"Management has to have employees understand who the customers are, and (managers) have to instill in those workers that you are trying to meet the needs of the public. And if you can't, your butt should be fired," Neal said.

"You're not there to pick a fight with people trying to do a transaction. You're supposed to be helping them. That's something that starts with management, and that's something management has to make clear to (employees)."

Assemblywoman Vonne Chowning, D-North Las Vegas, another subcommittee member, described DMV administrators as "very, very defensive. But without the oversight committee, without this constant watchful eye from the Legislature, I don't know if everything would've progressed as it has. And they (administrators) have to remember that employees take their cue from them."

No one has ever mistaken the DMV in Nevada -- or, for that matter, in any state -- for Wal-Mart, a place where a grinning greeter offers a hearty welcome to customers. But Genesis represents a new low even when judged against the DMV's historically unpopular standing, according to legislators.

Critics ascribe at least part of the problem to turnover in the DMV's top job: Drew is the agency's fourth director in two years. The lack of continuity has hobbled the department, said Assemblywoman Chris Giunchigliani, D-Las Vegas.

"The turnover has led to some mismanagement and some difficulties over the last couple of years. There's been an unwillingness to listen to employees and legislators," she said.

Giunchigliani's penchant for checking under the DMV hood irked at least one of Drew's predecessors. Former DMV Director Jim Weller left the post in 1997 grousing that some legislators were "total idiots" prone to micromanaging the department, a dig that Giunchigliani said he meant for her.

More recently, Giunchigliani gained few admirers within the department when she persuaded the Assembly Ways and Means Committee in May to reject a proposal to hire 50 new DMV employees. She pointed out during hearings on the request that the agency already had 83 vacancies among its 825 positions in the motor vehicle branch, and that 17 jobs created two years ago were never filled.

The proposal reflected the department's muddled leadership, Giunchigliani said. She blames part of the confusion on past DMV directors emphasizing the agency's public safety branch over the motor vehicle side. Previous agency chiefs such as Weller, a former FBI agent, and Don Denison, an ex-cop and now head of the state Parole Board, cared little about management and customer service, Giunchigliani said.

"They've had people in charge who have been more concerned with FBI-ish things than with customer service," she said.

Like past directors, Drew has a public safety background: He headed the DMV's investigations division before then Gov. Bob Miller named him acting director in November 1998. But Drew recognized early on that the agency's motor vehicle branch required greater attention -- in no small part because of Genesis.

"Without trying to speak ill of other directors, some of them may have come in here and had a certain interest in public safety. But I can tell you, 80 percent of my time the last 12 months has been chewed up by motor vehicle (issues) and Genesis, and rightly so," he said.

Drew and other DMV officials defend Genesis despite its myriad problems. The agency needed to replace its computer system both because of concerns regarding the Y2K bug and to enhance the DMV's services with such features as Internet license renewals, Deputy Director Ginny Lewis said.

The DMV processed about 40,000 vehicle registrations in October, a jump of 5,000 over October 1998.

Yet the chaos wrought by Genesis provoked questions over why the DMV opted to build an ambitious new system rather than buy a proven one from another state. Lewis explained that DMV laws differ too much from one state to the next to make purchasing a cast-off system worthwhile. Rewriting another state's program to fit Nevada statutes ultimately would have wound up costing the state more money and time than Genesis, she said.

Assemblyman Bob Beers, R-Las Vegas, refuses to swallow that assumption. He heads the legislative subcommittee overseeing Genesis and serves as president of a computer consulting firm.

"It makes no sense for one of the smallest states to pioneer computer software. And any mid- to upper-level manager who disagrees with that just doesn't get it," Beers said.

Whether or not Nevada should have bought a hand-me-down system from another state, Lewis conceded that DMV clerks needed more Genesis training prior to Sept. 7. "In a perfect world, we would've closed all the field offices for a week before the launch and taught all the employees more. But that wasn't an option," she said.

The agency sought to warn Nevada residents of the impending delays through a statewide public relations campaign composed of newspaper, radio and TV ads, as well as reminders mailed with license and registration renewal notices. But that effort -- and the fact that the subcommittee chaired by Beers held no meetings between May and September, which hurt lawmakers as far as receiving updates on the system's glitches -- has been lost amid the brickbats thrown at the DMV, Lewis said.

"Maybe I've been defensive and others have been defensive in meetings" with legislators, she said. "But it's been so intense since we went live with Genesis and we're trying to fix this as quickly as we can. Sometimes that's forgotten."

Fewer delays

DMV officials now report delays of less than two hours at branch offices -- still longer than under the agency's old computer system, but better than a month ago. On a recent weekday at the DMV office near Carey Avenue in North Las Vegas, several customers reported waiting less than an hour to finish their business.

"It's not as bad," Teresa Warmoth said. The 33-year-old sales assistant waited 45 minutes to renew the registration on her motorcycle. "When I went a few weeks ago, people were there for hours. I didn't even try to stay around."

Customers also took mercy on DMV employees who a few weeks ago may have flashed their pearly whites in a snarl instead of a smile. Randi Haupt, 44, who waited about an hour to receive a new set of license plates, said the tension between clerks and customers has ebbed considerably since the labored birth of Genesis.

"You can't blame the workers. They get frustrated, too. They're just trying to do their job," Haupt said.

Even so, Drew sees room for improvement. Yet long-range plans for ratcheting up the DMV's customer service could depend on whether Gov. Kenny Guinn elevates him from acting to permanent director. Drew noted that Guinn has said only that "you're director until I tell you otherwise."

Guinn spokesman Jack Finn said the governor will continue reviewing the DMV and Drew as part of his overall assessment of state government. In the meantime, Drew figures he may as well proceed full-steam -- or full-smile -- ahead.

"We need to help our employees to do a better job of helping the public, and I think we can do that," Drew said. "It's not going to happen in 30 days, but over the next several months and couple of years, we want to get better."

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