Ontario’s decision to scrap a long-standing annual fee for license plate stickers has created some confusion for drivers in the Stratford area, police say.
Stratford Police Const. Darren Fischer, the force’s community resource and media relations officer, took to social media this week to clear up the situation.
“Officers are seeing there is some confusion in the public in regards to whether or not you still have to renew the registration for your vehicle,” Fischer said Tuesday. “Although there is no fee associated with it and you’re not receiving a sticker to place on your license plate anymore, you do still have to register your vehicle either every year or every other year.”
Premier Doug Ford received little pushback from opposition parties in February when his government announced “red tape legislation” canceling license renewal fees for the owners of passenger vehicles, light-duty trucks, motorcycles and mopeds.
The pre-election change came into effect last month. It saves Ontario drivers $120 per year ($60 in northern Ontario) at an annual cost to the province of about $1.1 billion.
Billed as a strategy for making life “more affordable and convenient,” the legislation also enabled the province to refund by mail renewal fees Ontario drivers have paid since March 2020. Many of those checks were sent out late last month with more on the way throughout April, government officials have said.
In lieu of the stickers police use to identify out-of-date plates, the province also announced in February a plan to make License Plate Recognition technology more widely available to law enforcement in Ontario. The technology provides law enforcement the ability to read thousands of license plates per minute, but the tool is expensive and isn’t currently available to the province’s smaller forces.
In Stratford, Fischer said police previously had access to the technology through a provincial grant that has since expired. Following Ontario’s decision to scrap the sticker system, Deputy Chief Gerry Foster told the Stratford police services board in March that the force will apply for enough funding to outfit at least five cruisers.
In the meantime, police “still have access to a database that provides the information” Fischer said. “We can still manually query a license plate.”
The fine for driving with an expired plate is the same as it was prior to the changes – $110. The process can be completed online or in-person through Service Ontario.
-With files from the Canadian Press