Georgia Driver's License Fingerprinting
EFGA Letter Writing Campaign

Scott Jones (scottmjones@mindspring.com)
2/18/97

I've been asked to organize a letter writing campaign to address state laws passed last year that require all Georgia citizens to be electronically fingerprinted when they apply for or renew a driver's license.

I'm looking for volunteers (Georgia residents) to send letters of concern, minimally to Governor Zell Miller, and also to the following elected officials:

• Lieutenant Governor Pierre Howard
• Speaker of the House Thomas Murphy
• Your Georgia state senator
• Your Georgia member of the state House of Representatives

Why Bother?

Several bills are being introduced to repeal the fingerprinting law. Governor Miller has promised to veto any attempt to overturn the law. In addition, early momentum to repeal the law has waned a bit, and the media has been quiet lately on this issue.

Letter writing is needed now to support those elected officials sponsoring the repeal bills, while reminding Governor Miller and other pro-fingerprinting officials of our concerns.

At the very least, legislation is needed to narrowly restrict use of the fingerprinting database to protect the privacy of Georgia citizens and ensure the accuracy of the system. Read the "Concerns" below and make up your own mind.

EFGA may join other organizations that are expected to pursue legal action if the repeal effort fails. Writing our elected officials gives us "legal standing" needed if we wish to pursue legal action in the future.

Concerns

Many citizens resent being treated like common criminals just to get their license renewed. In addition, I believe the following concerns are very pressing:

• Use of the fingerprinting database, beyond the driver's license office, is largely left to the discretion of the Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety. The database could be easily shared with other Georgia governmental departments, other states, or the federal government, for any number of purposes.

• The fingerprinting database could and probably will be sold to any number of private concerns. A companion law specifically allows the database to be sold to car rental agencies. Credit reporting agencies and others are probably not far behind.

• The statute passed last year to permit fingerprinting was passed quickly on the last day of the session. Many legislators that genuinely opposed license fingerprinting unwittingly voted for the measure. A vote to remove license fingerprinting from the law passed by a wide margin early in the session, but the measure was quietly reinstated behind the scenes. If the legislature truly wants license fingerprinting in place, it should be affirmed by an "eyes open" vote with adequate discussion on the floor and full general understanding of the issue.

• No independent groups, to my knowledge, have certified the accuracy of our system. We are simply being asked to trust the vendor of the system and the Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety. The system will supposedly save us from having our "credit identity" stolen. Imagine what happens if the system decides that a well- meaning citizen is no longer who he has always been. A new standard of personal identity has been imposed, with no protection against failures of the system in place.

• The system provides no protection against fraud upon initial entry. If the system has never seen your fingerprint before, committing fraud is just as easy as it has always been.

• The case for such an expensive and elaborate system to prevent license fraud is weak. There were only 700 cases of fraud last year even though over one million licenses were issued.

What YOU Can Do

Please write the elected officials listed below. Write a letter in your own words (be polite!), then send me an e-mail (to scott@atlanta.com) letting me know who you wrote to and when so I can keep a tally. Let me know if you receive any "interesting" responses.

We recommend that you write as a private individual and not mention any association with EFGA or other groups. Your letter may carry more weight with elected officials this way.

You can use my letters as a model for writing your own letters.

Addresses:

GOVERNOR ZELL MILLER
203 STATE CAPITOL
ATLANTA GA 30334

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR PIERRE HOWARD
240 STATE CAPITOL
ATLANTA GA 30334

THOMAS MURPHY
SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE
332 STATE CAPITOL
ATLANTA GA 30334

Call the voter registration office for your county of residence to find out who your state senator and state representative are. Metro Atlanta residents can call the following numbers:

• Fulton: (404) 730-7072
• Dekalb: (404) 371-2241
• Cobb: (770) 528-2300
• Gwinnett: (770) 822-8787
• Douglas: (770) 920-7217
• Clayton: (770) 477-3372

For other counties, consult the government pages of your local phone book.

Once you know the name of your state senator, call (404) 656-0028 to get his or her official mailing address.

Once you know the name of your representative (house member), call (404) 656-5082 to get his or her official mailing address.

Resources

Check out http://www.mcwebs.com/repeal/

This is an excellent resource for this issue.

Let me know of any other resources you find.

I'm also interested in any resources describing how fingerprinting systems can be compromised. The initial consensus I've found has been that biometric identification is very secure if properly implemented.

Comments

Let me know how you feel about this effort. What did I leave out? Do you feel that EFGA should be pursuing this at all?

Please post comments to the EFGA Action mailing list (action@efga.org) or send comments directly to me at scott@atlanta.com.

Thanks for your participation!!

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