The North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG) estimated counties in Texas are losing roughly $80 million in revenue as people buy illegally sold paper tags instead of legitimately registering their cars.
The NCTCOG arrived at that $80 million figure by looking at one estimate of the number of paper tags sold illegally and then calculating how much counties would have collected in tax revenue if those cars had been legally registered.
Adding to the frustration for local counties, in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, hardly anyone is working to stop the illegal sale of tags.
“Unfortunately, the state has taken the money, and so we're trying to work on this without any funding,” Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins (D) said.
In 2017, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) vetoed funding for a clean air program that helped pay for special law enforcement task forces that worked to tackle paper tag fraud, including a group of specially trained Dallas County sheriff’s deputies who even found criminal gangs selling paper tags.
Those police units were funded with fees collected from car registrations.
But millions in fees already collected were never sent to local counties. Instead, the state legislature kept the money to help balance the state budget.
Jason Brown with the NCTCOG said more than $150 million is sitting in a state account that could help put the law enforcement task forces back on the street.
www.nbcdfw.com
