House Bill 2539 was unanimously voted to be amended by the Senate committee for transportation and infrastructure, Tuesday morning.
If passed, the legislation, which relates to exemptions to the commercial driver’s license requirements, would align the Division of Motor Vehicle’s speciality farming license to federal code.
Dwayne O-Dell from the West Virginia Farming Bureau, explained that the license would only pertain to to a very small number of farmers in the state which would grant them permission to certain farm vehicles during particular periods of the year.
General Counsel for the DMV, Adam Holley, came before the committee to ask if members could also apply a $25 annual fee to the legislation. Currently, Holley predicts that due to the license only applying to small pool of citizens, employees of the DMV would be unable to attain familiarity with the extensive process of applying the license
Holley stated that a fee of any amount of would be able to assist in educating employees if the program were to increase following implementation.
Sen. Greg Boso, R-Nicholas, motioned to amend the legislation by applying a $10 fee to the bill. Boso explained that the lower amount would be more comparable to the current cost of a commercial license in the state.
Following consideration, the committee voted to amend the legislation and report the bill to the full Senate with the recommendation of passage.
