Real ID legislation needs a reality check

"Real ID legislation needs a reality check" is the title of an article in The Roanoke Times. Here's how it begins:

States say meeting the new identification requirements will be an expensive nightmare. Congress should listen to those concerns.

The article relies upon a Virgina task force:

A Virginia task force led by Department of Motor Vehicles Commissioner D.B. Smit issued a report calling on Congress to extend the deadline, modify some of the law's more stringent requirements and help the states pay for the expensive changes.

The task force report warns that many of the state's poor, elderly or disabled residents may not be able to produce the necessary documents, leaving them without the identity cards that are "critical to everyone's way of life."

The report also estimates that compliance will cost Virginia as much as $169 million in startup costs and as much as $63 million in annual operating expenses.

And here's how the article ends:

Foisting "impossible and unrealistic" -- and unfunded -- mandates on the states will do nothing to enhance security. Congress should take another look at the Real ID legislation to ensure that it is not only "real," but also realistic.

Congress:

WAKE UP!