The Department of Motor Vehicles aims to be able to offer Vermonters a gender choice other than male or female on driver’s licenses by the middle of next year.
Wanda Minoli, the interim DMV commissioner, said the department is shopping for a new licensing and credential system to be installed “by July 2019, if not before.” The department’s request for proposals requires vendors to provide three areas to specify gender, one of which could be designated as nonbinary.
Vermont Public Radio first reported on the department’s consideration of a third option in October. Last week, the chair of the state’s Law Enforcement Advisory Board, which was asked to weigh in on the decision, told VPR the group had no objections to adding the option.
Rex Butt, the interim executive director of the Pride Center of Vermont, said the current system, which forces applicants to identify as male or female, creates a safety issue for people who do not conform to those categories.
“If you get pulled over and you don’t look like what’s expected, it can be an issue,” he said. “If you see someone and you’re now suddenly suspicious — ‘Who is this person?’ — clearly there’s a risk involved.”
Minoli said her department understands the desire for a nonbinary option. Karen Richards, of the Vermont Human Rights Commission, had previously reached out to the DMV to ask about the option. Minoli said the planned licensing system upgrade was “the perfect opportunity.”
But the department has confirmed only that its new system will allow the sex question to be expanded, not that it will immediately implement a nonbinary option. Minoli called the change “a work in progress.”
The department’s counsel is studying legislative language to ensure the option would comply with state law, Minoli said. “From a cursory view, we don’t believe there need to be any changes,” but a full review is ongoing.
Minoli also said the details of the gender question have not been determined. Other entities that have offered a third option have allowed applicants to select “X,” a standard recognized by the United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization. The “X” option was first implemented in North America by Ontario’s Ministry of Transportation in March, and Oregon in July became the first U.S. state to offer it.
Butt said that while gender nonbinary people identify in a number of different ways, the “X” option is a reasonable way to indicate that “male” or “female” identifiers don’t fit.
“Instead of trying to have 15 different designations — then where do you draw the line, and how do you explain what those different ones are? That would create just as much confusion,” Butt said.
David House, a spokesman for the Oregon DMV, said that after six months of offering the option, there were 961 active license holders with the “X” identifier in his state.
House said it took his department about a year to research the process, update its systems, and modify forms and procedures.
“The concern at first was that it may be more complicated than it sounds,” he said. “But it did turn out, actually, to be easier than we anticipated.”
House added that people vigilant about data security represent another category of applicants who choose the third option. “In these days of concern about identity theft, maybe you want your gender marker to be anonymous. All of those are encompassed by ‘X,’” he said.
Minoli said the Vermont department expects to receive responses to its RFP by Friday. The department will review those bids for compliance before selecting a vendor and deciding on the details of the gender question. “We are in the beginning process of the replacement of this system,” she said.
