{"id":520581,"date":"2018-02-11T07:38:09","date_gmt":"2018-02-11T14:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=520581"},"modified":"2018-02-11T07:38:09","modified_gmt":"2018-02-11T14:38:09","slug":"house-votes-down-front-end-license-plate-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2018\/02\/house-votes-down-front-end-license-plate-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"House votes down front-end license plate bill"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Roundhouse\"

Heath Haussamen \/ NMPolitics.net<\/p>

The Roundhouse in Santa Fe.<\/p><\/div>\n

Legislators hear from constituents on all manner of issues.<\/p>\n

But several lawmakers said Saturday they had gotten more emails about a proposal to require two license plates on each vehicle than about any other piece of legislation this year.<\/p>\n

The inconvenience seemed to outweigh the potential public safety benefits as the House voted down the idea by a vote of 27-38.<\/p>\n

Sponsored by Rep. Patricio Ruiloba, a Democrat and former Albuquerque Police Department officer, House Bill 158<\/a> would have raised the vehicle registration fee by $2 a year starting in 2018 and require a front-end license plate starting in 2022.<\/p>\n

New Mexico is one of 19 states that require only a single license plate on each vehicle. And as crime has risen, Ruiloba has argued the bill is a commonsense measure to address crime.<\/p>\n

Backers, including the New Mexico State Police, argue the requirement would help law enforcement identify vehicles involved in crimes.<\/p>\n

Still, others questioned the merits of raising the fee and about the hassle for New Mexicans who do not currently have a place on their vehicles for a front license plate.<\/p>\n

And there is no accounting for taste, as they say.<\/p>\n

Rep. Jason Harper, R-R\u00edo Rancho, said his own father was among the many who had asked him to oppose the bill.<\/p>\n

“He said, ‘please don’t make me mess up the front of my car.’ ”<\/p>\n

This article comes from\u00a0The Santa Fe New Mexican<\/a>. NMPolitics.net is paying for the rights to publish articles about the 2018 legislative session from the newspaper. Help us cover the cost by\u00a0making a donation to NMPolitics.net<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The inconvenience seemed to outweigh the potential public safety benefits as the House voted down the idea.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":405938,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3634,107],"class_list":["post-520581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-2018-legislative-session","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=520581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=520581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=520581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=520581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}