WELCOME TO LAS VEGAS—–BUT please don’t stay too long!
As a couple from Minnesota recently discovered, visitors to Las Vegas don’t pay their “Fair Share.”
The Minnesotans had apparently rented an apartment or condo for the winter months. They were enjoying the casinos, the dining and the entertainment when they learned that their “Fair Share” would have to include re-licensing their car in Nevada. It probably never crossed their minds. Where else in the country would a seasonal resident be required to turn in their home license plates and re-register their car or motorhome?
It certainly did cross the mind of the Constable of Las Vegas Township. This quaint throwback (Las Vegas also has a full time Professional police force) gets $100 for every “offender” he turns in to the Department of Motor Vehicles. “Just doing my job,” he explains, enforcing the law that, according to the DMV itself, is not enforced anywhere else in the state.
The Minnesota couple was warned that if they did not comply, after paying the $100, they could face a penalty of $1000 or more and even possible jail time! You could hear their tires squealing all the way to the Nevada state line, to the border with Arizona, California or Utah, where they would be much more welcome. Their comments on the Las Vegas evening news, “We won’t be back! Ever!”
In a state supported substantially by tourism, where visitors pay one of the highest sales tax rates in the nation, anyone from another state who wants to stay longer than 30 days is required by law to re-license their car. Otherwise, the Las Vegas Constable will decide they have not paid their “Fair Share.”
But what a bonanza for the Constable! (Just doing his job, remember) A leisurely cruise through any of the town’s RV parks would get him $100 at most of the RV sites. Just for the tow cars! And even if their owners were otherwise willing to do it, motorhome and RV licensing is astronomically expensive in Nevada.
So the mob is back in Las Vegas! Only this time it’s a legal entity shaking down tourists. I guess they think that if the casinos haven’t cleaned you out within 30 days they will let the Constable come around and pick your pocket.
The law was passed last year. It requires non-residents and seasonal residents who stay for 30 days or more to turn in their “home” state license plates and buy Nevada plates. The intent was probably not to discourage “snowbirds” but the effect (just ask the couple from Minnesota, and everyone they talk to for the rest of their lives) will be to put a damper on seasonal rentals, condo sales, vacation home sales and long term RV site rentals. Motorhomes and Fifth Wheel trailer owners will take their rigs and their money in the direction of Arizona, Texas, Florida or anywhere BUT Las Vegas and Nevada.
The DMV in Nevada tells us that the new law is being enforced only in Las Vegas and Henderson Townships not in North Las Vegas or the rest of the state. Really? How do we know that for sure? What we know for sure is that the only bright lights in Nevada are on the Vegas strip. There must not be any in Carson City, the Nevada state capital.
