State: Real ID potentially costly, problematic:

Nancy Hicks' article in the Nebraska Lincoln Journal Star gets off to a great start:

In the future, the state will have to make room for exact legal names on driver’s licenses — even names like Patricia Allision Steigleder-Vancleeflemaster or Francisco Delosangeles Buenrostro-Galvezvaldovinos.
(LJS File)

That means the Nebraska Department of Motor Vehicles will have to redesign the driver’s license to hold up to 125 letters for a name rather than the current 35. And it means residents will have to track down legal documents that prove their identity and legal name, starting with a certified birth certificate, to meet new federal requirements under the Real ID Act.

“If you didn’t have a headache before this, you’d have one now,” said state Sen. Tom Baker, after Beverly Neth, director of the state’s motor vehicles agency, detailed the federal requirements for future state driver’s licenses to the Legislature’s Transportation and Telecommunications Committee last month.

In fact, the Real ID is going to be a real headache for state bureaucracy and many Nebraskans, according to Neth’s description of the federal mandate. ...

Eventually they get to a point I rather believe myself:

Baker, chairman of the Transportation and Telecommunications Committee, thinks Congress may back away from the strict requirements before the May 2008 deadline because of the problems and added expense.

“I gotta believe that there will be such a public outcry that they are going to have to go back and redo it,” he said.

“Once the public gets ahold of this, they will see how ridiculous it is. We need to put some common sense back into this,” he said.

Say, Public!? Where are you? Get IN to this already ...