Dear Mahatma: Last year I sent you a picture of a car with a year-old temporary tag. Here's another photo from Riverdale of the 4-door Chevy with its now torn and tattered temp tag, some 18 months overdue. Remember this person who rides on your dime the next time you stand in line to renew your car tags, assess your property, and pay your taxes. -- Let's Make Arkansas Great Again
Dear Great: We're told by people in the know that a complaint may be made to the city attorney's office, where an assistant city attorney would help in preparing an affidavit for an arrest warrant to be issued for a violation of Arkansas Code Annotated 27-14-304. State law provides for a fine of up to $500, plus court costs of $115, or six months in jail, or both.
With an arrest warrant, the police would be obligated to serve that warrant. Thus, justice would be served. Sort of. Because a judge may let the guy off with a warning if it's a first offense. Or, given the egregious nature of the violation, a judge may lift up the heaviest law book on the shelf and throw it at the miscreant. Ya never know.
This brings to mind the flurry of responses to a recent column about drivers who flit about without insurance. Although it's not possible to determine how many such drivers there are, everyone has a horror story, or knows a horror story, about an accident that involved an uninsured driver -- may fire ants invade their shorts.
A couple of readers said -- impound their cars!
State law provides for impoundment under a variety of scenarios when a driver is found to be uninsured. The operator or owner of the vehicle is also responsible for all reasonable towing, recovery, storage and other incidental costs.
The most interesting thing we learned came in the mail from Philip D. Oliver, the Byron M. Eiseman Distinguished Professor of Tax Law at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock's W.H. Bowen School of Law.
With a title that long, a guy has to be extra smart. Additionally, we have personally met Byron M. Eiseman, and certify he is a cool dude.
Mr. Oliver passed along a copy of the UALR Law Review from winter 1999. In this edition he authored an article: "None for the Road: Addressing the Problem of Uninsured Vehicles and Drivers in Arkansas."
Let's zero in on what Mr. Oliver calls "two wide avenues of avoidance."
The first is to have insurance so that tags can be acquired. Then cancel the insurance. So for most of the year for which a tag is valid, the vehicle is uninsured.
The second is to "simply operate the vehicle without a valid tag. From the motorist's point of view, this entirely avoids the expense of insurance." Neither is there a cost to renew the vehicle's license. Yay!
A win-win. Except, as our correspondent notes at the top, the losers are people who follow the rules.
Vanity plate: TREHGGR.
Mahatma@arkansasonline.com.
Metro on 10/08/2016