Newcomer Finds DMV Drives Hard Bargain

Until a recent trip to the DMV, I’m proud to say that I had failed only one test in my life--a geometry test in ninth grade.

And I hope, unlike that last failure, that the California Division of Motor Vehicles doesn’t send a note home to my mother.

Like almost everyone else in California, I’m not a native. I just moved here from Virginia.

And as any honest new resident should--within 10 days of making his home here or taking a job--I showed up at the Ventura DMV to get my new license. I assumed it would involve a simple transfer of identities from one state to another and a new photo.

They wouldn’t even let me into the photo line.

First, there was a test, which I was not expecting. A hard test.

And I really flunked it. Not even close. I missed nine of 36 questions--four more than I am allowed as an original applicant, three times more than a renewal applicant is granted.

In most schools, 75% is clearly passing, but at DMV Tech, it’s get-back-in-line-and-try-again.

A call to the DMV in Sacramento revealed that my failing score fell somewhere between the 18th and 25th percentile, meaning, at best, only a quarter of those who took the test did worse than I did.

“You’re really down there on the lower end of the scale,” said DMV spokesman Evan Nossoff, just to make me feel better.

Turns out I’m far from the first to fail. Not too long ago, only a third of new license applicants passed the test on their first try, and only half of renewal applicants passed their shorter, 18-question test.

It was the kids who scored highest; about 63% of teens walked out with licenses on the first try and then proceeded to cut people off, speed in school zones and park 19 instead of 18 inches from the curb.

“They’ve read the book. They’ve studied for the test,” Nossoff explained, adding that by their third try, about 90% of applicants pass the test. After three strikes, you must reapply and repay the fee.

“We think the good drivers pass it,” Nossoff told me.

Ouch.

The high failure rate among adult drivers prompted the DMV to revise the test last April, making it both “more fair,” Nossoff said, and cracking down on cheaters.

The multiple-choice test’s writers eliminated the fourth option and got rid of ambiguous wording, they say. Before, the DMV created five tests annually; now it issues 10 tests every quarter with 200 possible questions.

Clearly I received the hardest version.

You can’t claim a language barrier. The test is written in 32 languages--including Ethiopian, Russian and Farsi--and the preparatory handbook comes in English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese and Tagalog.

It was all Greek to me.

“All the answers are in the book,” Nossoff said, be they in English or Tagalog.

Now I’m no dummy. I have taken a lot of tests in my day--SATs, APs, vision tests, some blood work, a drug test for this job. I know how to take tests, and my driving record is pristine.

But this test was unnecessarily hard, and to prove it, I feel I must risk DMV prosecution by revealing portions of the test to you, the driving public. Judge for yourselves.

Some of the questions were just nit-picky. Like, are California Department of Transportation vehicles orange or yellow? Apparently they are orange, but I think it’s safe to say that most drivers will recognize that the yellow El Camino cruising the 101 isn’t part of a state road crew.

And what about this geographically biased query: Is it true that shade from buildings or trees can hide ice? Yes, and apparently it’s hidden quite well, because I don’t think anyone has ever seen the frozen stuff in Southern California.

How about this fill-in-the-blank: “A person can ride in the back of a pickup truck when the . . . .”

In some parts of my home state of Virginia, the answer is “ . . . when the dog’s riding up front.”

Maybe that was the fourth choice the DMV cut in April.

Why, if I don’t own a pickup, never will own a pickup and never expect to travel in the back of a pickup do they want me to know that a person can ride in the back of a pickup only when it is equipped with a “restraint [seat belt] system?”

And if I’m not 3 years old, weigh significantly more than 45 pounds and do not know any 3-year-olds or 45-pounders, must I really know the rules on safety seats?

“Somewhere, sometime the issue may come up,” Nossoff said.

What I can’t figure out is, if the test is so hard, why are there so many cars on California’s roads? Forget carpool lanes and the L.A. subway, let’s just make the DMV test harder.

After my first failure I returned to the DMV office two weeks later. Different test, a few of the same questions. All in English, no sign of Tagalog or geometry problems.

While I waited, I finished reading the handbook and watched others struggling with the test I was about to retake.

And pass! Just three wrong, enough to walk out with a California license.

Now what does a guy have to do to get his photo retaken?