Conference vicki::boats

537.0. "Your Tax Dollars at Work?" by MUSKIE::BULLEN (NCD I.S. Manager) Tue Oct 10 1989 20:15

    I found this article in LAKELAND BOATING - A MAGAZINE FOR GREAT
    LAKES BOATERS, Oct 1989.  I'm amazed that I haven't heard of this before.
    
    How to Find A Stolen Boat -- If your boat is stolen, how do you
    ever find it again?  Or if you buy a boat from someone you never
    even met, how do you make sure they paid the original loan so creditors
    don't come knocking at your door?
    
    It's questions like these that prompted Crongress to establish a
    national boat identification system that will include owner
    identification, title, and loan information.  The same data is kept
    by most state governments since all boats must be legally registered,
    but the self-financing registry is expected to be vastly more
    effective.
    
    According to a spokesperson for Rep. Robet Davis (R-Mich.), who
    sponsored the bill, "There has been a problem for some time in clearly
    and quickly identifying the owners of vessels.  Boats stolen in
    one state would be taken across state lines, and it was very difficult
    to track them and get them back."
    
    An initial start-up budget is estimated near $8 million, to come
    from user fees for recording mortgages.  The U.S. Coast Guard is
    most likely the agency to carry out the Congressional mandate,
    according to an aide to the Congressional Committee on Merchant
    Marine and Fisheries.
    
    For boaters, the registry is likely to mean preferred mortgages
    in those states that voluntarily provide mortgage information to
    the data bank; simpler cross-registration of boats from state to
    state; and a means to prevent fraudulent title transfers.  No target
    date has been set for when the registry will actually begin, but
    funding for its start-up begins this month.
    
    

    To me this sounds like an opportunity for states to check on boaters
    registering their boats in other states to get a more reasonable
    fee, and/or give the Feds a new untapped source of tax dollars.
    Especially since all of us boaters are independently wealthy and
    can afford the luxury of our 100' yachts.
    
    -db-