Virgin Islands Bureau of Motor Vehicles requests $6.49 million for FY2026; officials cite automation, facilities and enforcement gaps

BARBARA JACKSON McINTOSH, director of the Virgin Islands Bureau of Motor Vehicles, told the Committee on Budget, Appropriations and Finance on July 1 that the agency is asking for a total FY2026 package of $6,486,954 to fund operations, personnel and continuing IT work.

McIntosh said the BMV expects to rely on a mix of funds for the request: a general-fund appropriation of $3,596,365, $1,000,000 from the BMV fund and $1,890,589 from the personalized license plate (PLP) fund. "We are here to provide testimony on our fiscal year 20 26 budget for the operations of the Bureau of Motor Vehicles," she said.

Why it matters: the BMV collects fees and taxes that flow to territory accounts and reported projected FY2025 revenue of $10,550,813; as of May 30, 2025 collections were $7,134,788 and McIntosh reported $7,844,179 on July 1. Committee members pressed agency leaders about where growth can come from and about operational gaps that could reduce revenue capture, such as unregistered and uninsured vehicles on the road.

Key budget and program numbers

- FY2026 request (total): $6,486,954; general fund portion: $3,596,365; BMV fund: $1,000,000; personalized license plate fund: $1,890,589. - FY2025 projected revenue: $10,550,813; BMV reported collections as of May 30, 2025 of $7,134,788 and $7,844,179 as of July 1. McIntosh said collections trend about $892,000 per month. - Point system grant: proposed cost $237,089; internal development of the VI point system is complete but implementation is pending a legislative amendment.

Automation, KPIs and paper reduction

McIntosh described an ongoing automation push and said the agency has nine key performance indicators; it has met seven so far this year and is "confident that we will reach the other 2 goals by the end of f y 20 25." The BMV is promoting online transactions (driver renewals and vehicle registrations) to reduce in-person demand and to cut paperwork. She described an electronic form flow that will auto-populate customer data, use an electronic signature pad and eliminate routine printing and rescanning.

Point system and enforcement

The BMV described internal work to track driver violation points and said the program's rollout is constrained by an existing statute. "Under the existing law, titled 20 secondtion 8 0 1 of the Virgin Islands code, a driver who accumulates 12 or more points must have their license suspended through a formal petition to the court by the director of BMV," McIntosh said, adding the bureau has requested an amendment to allow administrative suspensions when the threshold is reached. Committee members and agency officials said reliance on court petitions adds workload for the Attorney General and the courts and could slow enforcement.

CDL implementation

Agency staff said development of a Virgin Islands commercial driver's license program is underway but is complex: it requires medical reporting, drug and alcohol testing, entry-level driver training, testing records, integration with the point system, public outreach, website updates and driver-education accreditation. Staff described onboarding and training needs and said the rollout will require staffing and vendor work.

Compliance, registration and uninsured/unregistered vehicles

Multiple senators asked about the territory's stock of unregistered and uninsured vehicles and potential revenue loss. McIntosh said the BMV has identified approximately $1.6 million in unregistered-vehicle revenue through May of the fiscal year and described operational limits that make it difficult to cancel registrations when insurers lapse because insurance data are not fed to the BMV in real time. She and committee members discussed options including aligning registration and insurance end dates and stronger enforcement at ports and via peace-officer or administrative follow-up at the port of entry.

Special/limited-purpose licenses and Real ID

The BMV said the limited-purpose driver's license (sometimes described in the hearing as distinct from a "Real ID") remains available and is not limited to any single immigration cohort. "A real ID is indeed real as determined by the US Department of Homeland Security," McIntosh said, and she reminded customers that passports or green cards remain valid travel documents.

Facilities and fleet

Officials repeated long-standing concerns about facilities. St. Croix operations remain in trailers; prior proposals (including reuse of an old Hovensa training-school site) fell through because of vandalism and electrical and structural work that officials said would be costly. Agency staff said a previous cost estimate for a new St. Croix building was about $2–3 million but an updated refurbishment quote for the Hovensa site placed the work far higher (testimony reported an $8 million figure for refurbishing that site). Senators urged the agency and Public Works to seek clearer, competitive engineering estimates. The BMV also reported a small fleet of agency vehicles; several were described as inoperable or at end-of-life and in need of replacement.

Staffing, training and morale

The bureau reported 63 authorized positions with five vacancies at the time of testimony. Officials said most employees had received salary increases in FY2025, and human-resources staff said raises were implemented at the start of FY2025. The agency reported a training budget (historically modest) and described expanded travel and conference attendance to improve technical capacity. McIntosh said morale is strong and rated it about an "8" on a 1–10 scale, with primary operational concerns tied to facilities and staffing flows in particular offices.

Personalized plates and commemorative transfers

Committee questioning produced specific figures for transfers from personalized (vanity) plates to a deferred commemorative fund: CFO Linda Lloyd told the committee that transfers to the Virgin Islands Historical Commemorative Fund were about $358,420 in FY2023, $234,487 in FY2024 and $18,007.61 in FY2025 (to date in the record). Senators requested official breakdowns by fiscal year and asked for the BMV to provide the counts of specific plate types sold for the record.

Procurement, vendors and payments

McIntosh said the BMV is current on most vendor payments but reported three outstanding vendor payments at about 90 days. The exact total owed was not clearly presented during oral testimony and committee members asked for a written reconciliation; the agency said it awaited approval of a supply contract before completing some payments.

Cybersecurity and IT

The BMV said it completed a cybersecurity assessment with assistance from the Bureau of Information Technology and a contractor and that it had applied grant funding for that work. The IT project manager told the committee the bureau and BIT had completed identified remediation steps.

What the committee pressed for and next steps

Senators repeatedly urged faster enforcement of unregistered/uninsured vehicles, clearer port-level controls for imported commercial equipment, and legislative fixes to let the BMV administratively suspend licenses once the 12-point threshold is reached. Members also pressed for full cost estimates for rebuilding permanent offices (especially on St. Croix) and asked the BMV to provide additional documentation requested during the hearing: breakdowns of in-person vs. online revenue collections, counts of personalized and commemorative plates sold by fiscal year, vendor payment reconciliations, and more precise estimates of costs tied to CDL rollout and facility projects.

Ending

McIntosh closed by thanking committee members and staff and said the BMV would provide requested follow-up material. The committee recessed the hearing and moved to its afternoon docket.