Idaho legislators push to extend time for state ID compliance
BOISE — Idaho legislators are working to solve a problem that could deny Idaho driver’s license holders entry into federal facilities by the end of the year.
George Wood Jr. | Argonaut
Chairman of the State Affairs Committee Rep. Joe Palmer, R-Meridian, proposes to introduce a bill that would request the Dept. Of Homeland Security to grant Idaho an extension of the amount of time Idaho ID’s can be accepted by federal agencies. Currently, Idaho ID’s are not up to federal standards.
Idaho driver’s licenses and identification cards are not compliant with federal regulations mandated by the Real ID Act passed by Congress in 2005. On Jan. 19 the issue arose in Idaho, when the Idaho National Laboratory began to comply with the law.
The Idaho House Transportation and Defense Committee proposed a bill Friday requesting an extension for the amount of time Idaho ID cards would be accepted by federally regulated facilities.
If the Idaho legislature fails to pass legislation to request an extension from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), an Idaho ID would not be an acceptable form of identification at commercial airports, military bases and federal facilities such as the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) later this year.
Rep. Joe Palmer, R-Meridian, proposed the extension before the committee. He said even if the legislature does pass the request for a year extension, the decision is still on the DHS to approve Idaho’s request.
“We did want to request an extension to make it easier for the people of Idaho to get off and on the INL,” Palmer said. “We do not have any guarantee this piece of legislation will even do that. This is my personal try to see if they will accept that as an extension, and if they don’t, they don’t.”
Congress passed the Real ID Act after 9/11 to protect driver’s licenses from being duplicated by terrorists. Idaho is one of nine states that have yet to comply with the federal mandate.
Multiple legislators at Friday’s committee meeting said their constituents had communicated distress at the possibility of not being able to board airplanes or enter certain federal facilities.
To push back against what Rep. Richard “Rich” Wilis, R-Glenns Ferry, called an “unfunded mandate,” the legislature passed House Bill 606 in 2008, stating Idaho would not abide by the guidelines set by the Real ID Act.
“The only thing I can remember is voting against it for privacy measures, there are a lot of other reasons though,” Rep. Phylis King, D-Boise, said.
According to Alan Frew, Idaho Transportation Department motor vehicle administrator, an extension request must be submitted with reports about how Idaho updated it’s identification cards and how it plans to continue accomplishing different updates.
“We’ve done several things in conformance with the (Real ID Act), not intending to conform, but more intending to improve the security of our card and our own internal controls in our automated systems,” Frew said.
Frew said extensions can only be granted for a year, and the legislature must continue to request annual extensions until the state is up to par with federal regulation. However, the federal government will no longer grant extensions after 2020, the year the Real ID Act requires each state be compliant.
Currently, the only alternative Idaho citizens have is buying a passport, which is an acceptable form of federal identification at all federal facilities.
George Wood Jr. can be reached at [email protected]