THE SHELBY COUNTY CLERK’S OFFICE

On Tuesday, April 28, I had an appointment at 10 AM in the office of Debbie Stamson, the Shelby County Clerk and her assistant, Susan Henning. This was a meeting that I requested pursuant to my open records request concerning automobile registration and other functions of the Clerk's office. In response to my initial request I got a very oblique answer from Mr. Craig Willis, the Assistant County Attorney. Not satisfied with this answer I asked to meet with Ms. Stamson and the meeting was graciously granted.

The next day, I heard on the news that eight employees from her office have been indicted and that Councilwoman Ware was also involved. What a shock.

My investigation had nothing to do with the criminal charges against the eight employees. All I was asking was "What are the duties of your office and are you sure you are collecting all the fees that are due to you?" They had no answer and basically depend on the honesty of the average citizen to do the right thing. Take a look at other cars as you drive around and see if everyone has a 09 or 10 little sticker on their license and is it a legitimate one or one cranked out on their computer.

What I found was a typical bureaucratic mess that is symbolic of practically all government, local and national. Their main job is selling more than 650,000 vehicle license plates per year. (the wheel tax is about $106.00 for city residents and $30.00 less for a county car).They have no way of checking to prove if everyone is paying their legal fees which is different in the City limits versus the county. Suppose someone who paid last year simply does not pay? How about the owner of a car from another state who moves here? The penalty for not paying is practically nonexistent. The person can claim that it was setup and not driven for the last year. There seems to be very little cross checking with other data bases. Moreover, they collect the hotel and motel tax (about $150 million per year), take 5% for the support of their office and turn over the rest to the County Trustee.

I will report more in the days to come as I check what other states do in this area. For now I am still trying to digest another local scandal and wondering why I am still living in Memphis and hoping for a better future.