The NC House Oversight Committee held a hearing Thursday afternoon continuing hearings from agency and department leaders to examine what they do, how they do it, and how they measure their success.
North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles (NCDMV) Commissioner Wayne Goodwin, who announced yesterday that he will step down when his term ends, having led the DMV since 2022. The announcement comes as the NCDMV undergoes an audit by the Office of the State Auditor.
Most of the legislators revealed they had received numerous phone calls and emails and had even been stopped in the grocery store for the terrible service they received from the DMV.
“Under your tenure, the DMV has been one of the most dysfunctional agencies in state government,” committee co-chair and House Majority Leader Rep. Brenden Jones, R-Columbus told Goodwin, who said he would not reapply for the position given that there are various positions being posted under Democrat Gov. Josh Stein’s administration. He would comment later on in the hearing that, “I had the best sleep of my life last night because I made the change.”
When Jones asked why doesn’t he just leave the job now and let someone else be appointed, Goodwin said that it wouldn’t be helpful to step down when there are so many projects and initiatives underway and that he doesn’t quit a job until it is finished.
He blamed the 2.5 million people moving to the state in such a short time span, the need for more staff and offices, employees being overworked and underpaid, and the need for more modernization as the reasons for the long wait times in line and waiting for months to get an appointment.
Goodwin also begrudgingly accepted responsibility after Jones repeatedly asked him who was responsible for the DMV’s failures over the past three years.
“Well, as Harry S. Truman would say, the buck stops with me, but I think any reasonable person that I know would know that I’m not running the entire DMV, but I am the commissioner,” he said.
“You’re the head, so you say you take responsibility for the failures?” asked Jones
“I take responsibility,” Goodwin replied.
He also said since he was taking responsibility for the “hiccup” the DMV was having, he would also take responsibility for the department’s achievements, including having one of the lowest vacancy rates in state government, down to 10%, sometimes 9%. In addition, starting the first week of April, the number of offices that will open at 7 am will go from 50 to 92, and four additional locations will be open in the summer on Saturdays, bringing the number to 20.
Rep. Harry Warren asked if the DMV could have split shifts and be open later in the evening to accommodate people getting home from work. Goodwin said they did look at that, but that would require more employees to be hired.
Jones asked again why things like the online appointment portal haven’t been fixed for the past three years.
“The online appointments are very popular, and there’s only so many 20-minute time blocks in the given day, the insurance commissioner doesn’t have the power or the authority to add more minutes to a day, only God almighty can do that,” Goodwin said.
“I guess it’s going to take him to get appointments made too, isn’t it?” Jones commented.
Rep. Allen Chesser, R-Nash, questioned Goodwin’s office’s decision to renew driver’s licenses for 16 years even though it would have conflicted with the Real ID law, which required an 8-year renewal. Goodwin said they erroneously recommended it and corrected it.
Chesser also questioned why the DMV granted a contract to a vendor that could not comply with state law requiring ID cards to be printed in color. That in turn, he said, led the state to purchase more equipment for the vendor to be able to print in color, costing taxpayers more money.
Goodwin said it was unintentional, but Chesser disagreed, stating that he had previously testified that he hoped the General Assembly would be amenable to changing the law.
Rep. Grant Campbell, MD, R-Cabarrus, asked him if the department is failing in its mission and if he believes that part of the failure is a work culture issue in the department that money won’t fix.
Goodwin replied that the department can succeed in its mission if employees are better paid, not overworked, and have more offices and new employees, adding that workers get threats all the time on the front lines.
Rep. Jake Johnson, R-Polk, discussed the issues with the many layers of government of having departments under other departments and the problems that come with that, mentioning the North Carolina Office of Recovery and Resiliency (NCORR) being under the North Carolina Department of Public Safety, (NCDPS) as an example. He alluded to opinions that the DMV should be privatized, and, though he doesn’t think they are there yet, noted that it may need to be a standalone agency in the future.
Goodwin touted that there are nine kiosks in various locations across the state that have produced 2,700 transactions a month. He added that they would like that number to grow to 20 kiosks, but there needs to be 4,500 transactions a month in order to do so. So far, 21,000 people have taken advantage of the kiosks. There were also 988,000 people who used the online portal in 2023, leaving him to comment that the lines and the wait times at the DMV offices would have been much worse if people didn’t go online.
Rep. Timothy Reeder, MD, R-Pitt, had asked him why there wasn’t a dashboard for the public to see wait times for different DMV locations. Goodwin said he could provide a sublink to him, but Reeder still questioned why it wasn’t on the website and asked if he had it within his power to release that information or if his boss had to do it.
Goodwin said he didn’t write the website’s code, to which Reeder then asked, “I guess what I’m asking you is if you’re not the one who can authorize to put data on your website, who is it that we need to ask that question?” Goodwin replied, his boss, NC Department of Transportation Secretary Joey Hopkins.
Jones told Goodwin while it was fair to say he was probably his harshest critic, his criticism was not personal.
“I think you’re a good man, but again, sometimes good men don’t make the best leaders, and the agency certainly has problems,” he said. “I do wish you the best in your next endeavor. I hope you find a spot that suits you well and that you have a very successful next career, whatever that is.”
Goodwin thanked him and the committee members, adding, “I have chosen a happier life, and I look forward to hearing look forward to hearing of great things to come from this body, and from the secretary, and the governor.”
Follow Carolina Journal for more on the hearing of NCDOT Secretary Joey Hopkins.