Toll tag tx license#

“We're not necessarily seeking all of it at once. NCTCOG is currently working on a plan to use federal grant money to try to re-launch the Dallas-Fort Worth area task forces by next summer.īut to keep those task forces running here and across the state - they say they will eventually need that state funding. “It's a huge problem, and it's one that can largely be fixed by turning loose of the dedicated money in Austin that our taxpayers have already paid for this purpose,” Jenkins said. 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. Instead, the state legislature kept the money to help balance the state budget. Those police units were funded with fees collected from car registrations.īut millions in fees already collected were never sent to local counties. 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.

“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.

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.Īdding to the frustration for local counties, in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, hardly anyone is working to stop the illegal sale of tags. 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. In one case a dealer they investigated even entered a football stadium into the system as a driver’s home address.Ĭonstitutional Sheriff's Group Prohibited From Offering State Credits for Texas ClassesĪnd tollways aren't the only place where fraudulent tags appear to be costing the community millions. Last week, NBC 5 Investigates showed how undercover constables in Austin have bought real Texas paper tags from licensed car dealers willing to enter any name or address in the state's tag system. Texas buyers tags should only be issued to people who actually buy a car from a dealer and should never be sold. The two tollway authorities said they were unable to say for certain how many of the tags with no valid address were bought fraudulently, but as NBC 5 Investigates has shown, paper tag fraud is now widespread across Texas. 1, 513,692 cars traveled the tollways with paper tags that had no valid contact address, racking up more than $14.7 million in unpaid tolls.Īnd in Houston, the Harris County Toll Road Authority reported 349,953 cars with paper tags that could not be matched to an owner have racked up an estimated $10.8 million in outstanding receivable revenue. The North Texas Tollway Authority said that since Jan. Now NBC 5 Investigates has learned illegal paper tags may also be robbing Texas taxpayers and toll road users of millions of dollars in revenue.

Toll tag tx license#

First, an investigation showed how unscrupulous car dealers were illegally selling hundreds of thousands of Texas paper license plates online, allowing people to drive cars that wouldn’t pass a state inspection, and even helping criminals hide from police.