House passes bill to raise cost of drivers license

Drivers license fees would go up three bucks under legislation that cleared the House. The D-O-T would use the extra dough to buy a new computer system. The Senate voted to raise the fee by five-dollars, but the House scaled it back a smidgeon to three dollars. Representative Jeri Huser, a democrat from Altoona, says it’s the best way to raise the money needed for the new computer system. She says the proposals is good for roads, good for Iowans and provides the needed services.But Representative Don Shoultz, a democrat from Waterloo, voted against the fee increase. Shoultz says lobbyists for the D-O-T pressed for the higher fee so they wouldn’t have to find the money for the computers by cutting other things out of their budget. He says they’re going to make people who have to use their cars to get back and forth to work pay for the computers instead, and he says he doesn’t think that’s right.Shoultz says the legislature has balked at raising other fees to finance state operations, and wonders why this project is more important. The Senate now must decide whether it’ll go along with the House’s lower, three dollar license fee increase.