LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Kevin Gonzalez made his way into the DMV on Cimarron and Flamingo for a title transfer, only to learn the process has been delayed again.
“My appointment was November 19th,” explained Gonzalez. ” I was supposed to have the title before February 27th and now it’s a month later.”
Gonzalez said the DMV is still trying to play catch up and wonders if it could be a staffing issue or something more.
“It use to be a one-day service, you come in and now you have to wait in a line,” Gonzalez added.
Kevin Malone, the public information officer with the Nevada Department of Motor vehicles said it’s a work in progress.
“As of February 19th, 2023, we had 52 vacancies in the Las Vegas field offices and another 46 in the northern field offices and that’s a total of 173 for the department as a whole,” said Malone.
However, it is a lengthy process to get new employees behind the desks.
“It takes 8 weeks to train a DMV technician once they’ve been hired and about a half of that is actually sitting on the window serving customers with really close supervision and the other half of it is in the classroom,” Malone added.
He also said jobs aren’t always posted. The DMV takes resumes and compiles them into a list and vet candidates from that list until another position is needed to be filled.
“Anyone can send us a resume just explaining what they want like a frontline technician then the more formal job openings are listed on the careers.nv.gov website,” said Malone. “So if you’re looking for something in the compliance enforcement division or auditor or IT person, those will be listed on the state recruitment website.”
Another issue causing frustrations for the DMV? When people don’t show up for their appointments.
“One factor is we’ve got about a 45% no-show rate for appointments,” added Malone.
If you can’t keep your appointment, it’s recommended you go online and cancel it so someone else can book it.
“Couple reasons for that is people make the appointment then they discover they can do their transaction online,” said Malone. “These appointments are unfortunately about 4 weeks out and people’s circumstances change and they can’t keep it.”
He said the Nevada legislature is considering paid raises for all state workers and he hopes it’ll go through.
“Retention is kind of a big issue because other state agencies pay a little bit more than the DMV for more similar jobs and the state government as a whole typically pays less,” said Malone. “So we do have a problem with retention and we do what we can to try and keep people.”
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