Less than 1 percent of Texas drivers have personalized license plates, but with the launch of a new program, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is hoping to increase that number. In August, TxDOT began offering Texans the option of designing their own plates from several available templates.

In 2005, the Texas Legislature directed TxDOT to contract for services offering specialty plates to citizens. In the only public-private partnership of its kind in the country, the department contracted with Texas-based company My Plates LLC, which allows users to create customized plates on its Web site, www.myplates.com.

The state of Texas isn’t funding the project, and My Plates is directly responsible for designing, marketing and selling the plates. A portion of sales will go into Texas’ general revenue fund, and the contract guarantees a minimum of $40 million to the fund over a five-year period.

“Personalized plates are a way for the state to make money in hard times,” said Kim Miller Drummond, public relations manager for My Plates. “The Legislature had to get innovative. This is something no one in the U.S. has ever done before. The state spends no money but makes $40 million in five years. That’s why public-private partnerships are so popular; they’re the new thinking that we can have concepts from private enterprise that work in government.”

In the past, Texans have had to renew personalized plates every year, but the new partnership allows plates to be purchased for one-year, five-year or 10-year terms.

“We did research around Texas to find out what people liked and didn’t like,” Drummond said. “They wanted the plates for a longer term, so when we submitted our proposal, we included five- and 10-year renewal terms and the state accepted.”

Although the My Plates renewals are available in one-, five- and 10-year terms, vehicle-registration renewal requirements haven’t changed. Drivers who purchase a specialty plate for a five- or 10- year term must still update their vehicle registration sticker every year, unless they own a new vehicle, in which case registration stickers may last for up to three years.

The My Plates personalized plates cost from $95–$795 depending on the license plate and renewal term chosen. The My Plates personalized- plate cost does not include vehicle registration and fees, which are paid separately through county tax offices.

The portion of revenue that goes into the state’s general revenue fund ranges between 30 to 45 percent depending on the plate. Additionally, TxDOT receives $8 per year for every license plate sold through My Plates. And as with all specialty license plates, TxDOT returns 50 cents to the county for each plate sold.

When customers create personalized license plates through the My Plates Web site, they pay through the site or over the phone then pick up the plates at their county tax office about three weeks later. Drummond said that prior to opening the Web site for license plate orders, My Plates representatives called all 254 Texas counties to introduce the program and make themselves available for questions. Bell County Tax Assessor-Collector Sharon Long received one of those phone calls and said My Plates gave her a special phone number to call if the county encountered any problems with the program.

“We received one plate yesterday, and that’s the only order we’ve had,” Long said. “It’s really hard to tell if we’ll have problems now because we don’t know how many plates will be ordered from this company. We just have no way of knowing.”

Long indicated that an issue her county may face if many customers order personalized plates from My Plates is a lack of storage space.

“We are cramped for space, and it’ll definitely be an impact if we start getting a lot of them or the customers don’t come in and pick them up,” she said. “Right now we’re just planning to store them in the main office.”

When it’s time for customers to renew personalized plates, they receive the plate renewal notice with their vehicle registration renewal notice even though the two aren’t linked. “Right now, when a customer orders a license plate from My Plates, it’s not linked to the vehicle,” said Ro’Vin Garrett, tax assessor- collector for Brazoria County. “The tax office has to link it to the vehicle. When you get the plate, it goes to me; I’ll contact you, and then we’ll sell you a sticker that’s linked to that plate. The company plans to sync the plates to vehicle registration in the next two years, but for now we do that in the office.”

My Plates plans to begin advertising in the Houston area, including Brazoria County, in November. Garrett met with the company and previewed the advertising campaign. She said the television commercials are informative and fun.

“They’re going to do major stations in the Houston area and local stations as well,” she said. “The commercials are funny. They’ll hit people.”

Drummond from My Plates said the company intends to visit county tax assessor-collectors in the markets where the company has begun advertising just to make sure counties know what’s coming. “Anything that counties want or need, we want them to contact us,” Drummond said. “We already have six or seven counties we’ve met with individually. We’re trying to let them know we’re here to help them. We want to do everything we can to make this a successful program.”

Garrett said Brazoria County hasn’t had to implement any special training specifically for the new personalized plates.

“It’s just going to be specialty plates training, which we’ve already done,” Garrett said. “It’s nothing major, just a reiteration of what we’re already doing but just adding the My Plates factor to it.” Before its launch Aug. 1, My Plates received several hundred inquiries, and since its launch, several thousand people have visited the Web site.

“If they (My Plates) do the work they say they’re going to do, if it’s as big a boost to the state as they say it’s going to be, yes, our commissions will grow and it will benefit the county,” Garrett said.