DeLand man not happy with new tag

State says anomalies can slip by

By Jen Horton
BEACON STAFF WRITER

posted Mar 12, 2010 - 9:50:11am

James Mikell is not a terrorist. He’s a local business owner. Mikell’s Landscaping Products has been at 2049 W. State Road 44 for more than 22 years.

But when Mikell went to the Division of Motor Vehicles to get a new tag for his boat, he got a terrorist tag, quite literally.

“I had lost the tag for my boat, so I needed a new metal tag,” he said. “I just went to the tag office. The lady there made a comment: ‘You’ll be able to remember this one.’”

The registration paperwork was on top of the boat plate, so Mikell didn’t really pay too much attention to his new number. A tag is a tag, right?

When he got home, he realized the plate read 911 TER.

He didn’t think that was an appropriate plate for anyone to have, because of the obvious post-9/11 associations.

“It does make me uncomfortable,” he said.

Mikell intends to take the plate back to the DMV to see if they’ll exchange it for one that doesn’t make him uncomfortable.

Mikell said he had the tag lying on the counter at his office, and customers commented on it.

“Everybody that’s seen it said something about it,” he said.

Dave Westberry, a spokesman for the DMV, gave The Beacon a crash course on license plates.

“It’s a pretty simple process,” Westberry explained. “The plates are manufactured through PRIDE — the prison industries. The numbers are alphanumeric and assigned through a computer. The numbers are randomly generated.”

The computer’s software does have some filters, to keep certain configurations off the streets (or waterways), but there are anomalies, such as Mikell’s.

Westberry said that 911 TER was not a configuration the DMV had previously considered.

Personalized plates also have censors, Westberry said. An applicant can submit a request for a personalized plate, and that is reviewed to make sure it is not objectionable.

“Customers can go to the Web site and check out our options,” he said.

Westberry wanted to make sure folks know that if they ever get a plate they find objectionable, like Mikell’s, they can return the plate to the DMV, and a new plate will be issued.

For more information about the DMV, visit www.flhsmv.gov.

— jen@beacononlinenews.com

Reader Comments

The comments posted below are posted by readers, not by The Beacon staff. These comments express the views and opinions of the authors, and not the administrators, moderators or webmaster. The comments forum is governed by these rules. Please use the report abuse link if you find offensive comments.

Comment on this article

Commenting is closed for this article.

If you would like to contribute a letter to the editor, please click here.

Did you find this story interesting or informative? Subscribe to The DeLand-Deltona Beacon to read more stories by Jen Horton, along with others from our award-winning writers. Subscribe now!