New vehicle inspections rules put bite on local repair shops

By DAVID HULSE

YULAN, NY — New York State officials say that motor vehicle emission checks must change to keep pace with Federal Clean Air rules and accordingly, state inspection stations in 53 upstate counties must begin complying this month with testing procedures that metropolitan area counties have undertaken in recent years.

State Senator John Bonacic said that air pollution doesn’t respect county borders and rule changes by the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) are designed to keep one standard throughout the state.

But the changes, which involve private garage inspection stations’ purchase of up to $3,600 or more in mandated computer equipment plus new accessory costs, could significantly impact rural motorists’ access to inspection stations.

DMV says more than one-third, 2,600 of the 7,000 upstate inspection stations, had not yet signed on to the new program as of this week.

Jeff Haas, and his father Don Haas before him, have been inspecting cars at the Yulan Service Station since New York began requiring inspections, but Haas says the new rules and costs will put him out of the inspection business.

The new rules require computer equipment to test “on board diagnostics” (OBD) capabilities built into cars since 1996. Haas isn’t challenging the change as much as the way the state has gone about implementing it.

New York has contracted with a SGS Testcom to institute the New York Vehicle Inspection Program (NYVIP). Under the program, SGS provides all hardware, software and support for the program, which is scheduled to run for seven years.

The basic equipment package is $1,664 but options, which include a steel cart to hold the system ($365), a vinyl cover ($50), a better printer, monitor and bar code scanner run the cost up to $3,600 or more. The package comes to mechanics unassembled.

Equipment costs include SGS maintenance, but Haas believes they are artificially high. For example, an optional 15” IBM flat-screen monitor, which retails for $549, costs $980 through SGS and as much as $1,140 if the upgrade isn’t made in the initial purchase.

Inspectors will need to take additional training and two recommended training manuals cost $60 each, or eight hours in training is available for $200 plus $60 in training materials. Garages also will need to add a dedicated telephone line to connect with SGS computer network and SGS will collect more than $.36 for each call to the network.

Haas also challenged the state’s justification for the change, adherence to Federal Clean Air Act, noting that some states have no vehicle inspection programs at all.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency website currently lists websites for emissions programs in only 31 states and municipalities.

Haas said he would be satisfied if the state simply allowed garages that did not want the new program to continue inspecting older vehicles that don’t have OBD.

Upstate inspection costs now include $10 for the safety inspection fee and $6 for an inspection sticker. With the new program, the state would allow an increase of $5 to $21.

Haas said that too is unfair since downstate metropolitan area counties will collect $37 for the same service.

State officials say the higher fee is historically related to an expensive equipment that city area stations were required to purchase in an earlier inspection program.

Doing some 300 inspections a year, Haas said it would take him more than a year to recover the basic equipment costs, without considering any options or associated telephone charges.

“It’s a rip-off,” he said, “and the average motorist is going to get the worst of it, because there will be fewer places to get inspections and the stations that are left will have more incentive to pass on their higher overhead costs.”