DENVER — All Denver Motor Vehicle Title and Registration offices closed on Monday and will be closed on Tuesday as well. The DMV says this was done in order to address a significant mail demand and reduce customer delays.
Monday afternoon, Mallory Kost was on a mission to check errands off her list.
"Hopped around multiple DMVs, and this is my last stop and they’re surprisingly closed," Kost said.
For both Monday and Tuesday, all Denver Motor Vehicle Title and Registration offices will be inaccessible.
"I’ve never heard of a DMV out of the blue closing, so I think it is kind of strange," Kost said.
For some, it’s also frustrating to now have to plan a day to return, but for the DMV, the decision was necessary and timely.
"Currently, we have about a 52-day backlog. We're hoping to get 10 days caught up within our backlog, which is thousands of transactions, titled transactions. Those transactions are dealer paperwork that has been mailed to motor vehicle," said Jason Salazar, deputy director of Denver Motor Vehicle.
If employees across all DMV locations reach their target, they’ll reduce the mail backlog by 22% in just two days. Currently, the backlog is leading to increased traffic at all locations, calls and wait times.
"Well, the pandemic certainly did create complications around processing the mail. But in addition to the pandemic, we've had significant turnover here at DMV," Salazar said.
To address turnover, 26 new DMV employees will be added across all city offices by the end of the month.
"I know it's going to take some time as we train new staff members, but once we do have those folks trained and fully operational, I believe this is going to be a short-lived problem for us," Salazar said.
Right now, the DMV is granting extensions to give everyone enough time to process their registration. All offices are expected to reopen on Wednesday.
For now, there aren’t more closures planned for the rest of the year.
